


Some Are Born to Sweet Delight (Some Are Born to Endless Night)

by Draco_sollicitus



Category: Star Wars, Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Based on a Tumblr Post, F/M, Fluffy but also a hint of the Horror, Happy halloween, Libraries, Mistaken Identity, Misunderstandings, More like Meet Spooky, Vampire AU, meet cute
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-11
Updated: 2019-05-05
Packaged: 2019-07-29 12:38:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 38,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16264364
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Draco_sollicitus/pseuds/Draco_sollicitus
Summary: Librarian Rey Smith enjoys her job immensely. She gets to serve the population of the small town of Jakku, read on the job, creatively solve problems using her many skills - and sometimes ogle the most handsome patron they have, a mysterious bookworm named Poe. When he exits the building in a rush one day and leaves behind the leatherbound book he's always writing in, Rey picks it up and reads a few pages. It's a riveting tale of vampires, legends, and the ancient struggle of good versus evil, as well as the narrator's barely tamed bloodlust-She had no idea he was a writer!





	1. Auguries of Innocence

**Author's Note:**

> I was sent this prompt by supremequeenofthenerds:
> 
> "you accidentally threw away your diary about your daily life as a werewolf/vampire (any kind of non-human creature) and someone happened to pick it up and commended how great your story writing is like hahah wow is there a sequel to this?"
> 
> the prompt is from [this tumblr post](https://alternateuniverseotp.tumblr.com/post/178873339196/more-random-aus-because-one-can-never-be-enough)

It was a typical Monday morning that found Rey Smith skittering down the cobblestones to the front door of the library. She was no later than usual, but something under her skin told her that she was _late._ The alarm clock hadn’t gone off, her coffee seemed to take three times longer than normal, and then she nearly burned the roof of her mouth off taking a sip – her boots were not where she had left them last night, and her cat (okay, so the cat who kept showing up at her front door) was determined to keep Rey inside the walls of her little front yard, maowing angrily whenever Rey tried to cross the threshold.

The universe had conspired to _make_ Rey late, so even though she unlocked the door at 8:55 a.m., she still felt as though she were an hour off schedule, rather than five minutes early. She hung her coat up inside her tiny shoebox office, flipping her hair out of the collar of her jumper, and tugged her trousers up her hipbones (her belt had been forgotten in her awkward dash this morning). She absentmindedly pulled her hair up into a ponytail as she walked out to the floor of the library.

The lights came on first, and she hummed to herself as the sections of the library lit up, one by one. Next were the computers, which had seen better days: Rey booted each one up and made sure it was actually connecting to the internet before trying to log in to the network. She didn’t have to wrestle the internet box today, thankfully, and instead she busied herself setting out paper and pens for patrons to use as scrap paper, and setting out the forms for reference requests. Last was her own slightly more up-to-date computer, humming to life on her large mahogany desk which overlooked the reference section and the reading section.

Children’s was after that, and Rey tidied up a few leftover trains that had been abandoned the previous day – then, she rearranged the books on display in the corner near the Read Aloud carpet. Finally, she made it to Young Adult, easily their most popular section. The middle-grade books looked neat enough, but she chewed on her thumbnail anxiously while examining the gaps in the YA shelves. No matter how small Jakku was, their teen readers – the girls, especially – had a voracious appetite for reading she was afraid she couldn’t keep up with. It’d be another email to Niima’s sister branch this afternoon to see if their larger catalog could spare some older titles for the somewhat-lacking collection at Jakku.

The library opened at ten on the dot, and before she unlocked the doors, Rey opened the blinds, letting in the autumn sun. She basked in the golden light for a second, her face tilted up to the sky, before she walked to her desk to grab the keys. Rey paused for a moment, staring at the hulking, massive collection behind her desk that no one ever seemed to go to, except for…

Rey shook herself. If only one patron out of a thousand were interested in a section, it wouldn’t do to keep it – the space could be better used for an extension of their YA collection, or even their adult fiction. It didn’t matter _who_ the patron was. Or what he looked like.

There was one person waiting when she unlocked the doors. She smiled at Mr. Davies as he tottered in, his wrinkled face lighting up in response.

“How are you today, Mr. Davies?” She asked, making sure the doors were fully unlocked.

“I’m well, thank you,” he answered, clutching his notebook to his chest. “And I told you not to call me that!”

“Alright, Ted,” Rey laughed. She gestured towards the computers, and they began to walk together. “New worlds to explore today?”

“Yes, my granddaughter was talking about some sort of website,” Ted said, before launching into a very convoluted story about memes and _moods._

“Do you need help finding the website?” Rey asked, brow furrowed. She wasn’t quite sure she had followed, but hell, her job was often finding things alongside patrons, a learning experience for them both.

“No, no,” Ted patted his notebook cheerfully as he took a seat. His hat came off, and he dragged a hand through the wisps of his whitened hair. “It’s right in here.” He merrily typed away, and Rey smiled fondly at him before going to her desk and sorting through the requests that had come in through their digital site last night, as well as the forms that had been submitted in hard copy the previous day. She looked up now and then to greet patrons as they walked by, and more than once, she hopped down from her stool to walk someone to a section or to help complete a search.

Back at her desk, Rey found herself hitting a few obstacles before lunchtime. Ben Kenobi was the only other librarian at Jakku, and he didn’t work on Mondays, so Rey gnawed her lip and tried to sort through the stack of papers in his beautiful if illegible handwriting. “That’s either _Rembrandt_ or _Remembrance,_ ” Rey muttered to herself, staring down at the paper and frowning.

“I believe it’s _Revenant_ ,” a smooth voice suggested, and Rey looked up quickly, almost falling off her perch. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.”

The Patron was here. Sure, so Rey called him _The Smolder,_ but only to herself, and never out loud, and only when he was…yep, he was smoldering.

“It’s okay,” Rey squeaked. _Deep breath._ The man (whose name was _Poe_ , which she had learned a month ago) leaned over the desk, his brown eyes latched onto hers, his full, pouty bottom lip stuck out in an unfairly attractive way. She blinked, realizing she’d been staring for almost ten seconds without saying a word, which couldn’t possibly be friendly, helpful behavior. “Revenant,” Rey repeated, looking back down at the paper with Ben’s elegant scrawl. “That’s a word you don’t hear very often.”

“No, it’s really not.” _Seriously, why does even his voice have to be that pretty? Don’t look, don’t look, don’t look –_ Rey looked. And stared. She barely could force herself to listen to the words his ludicrously pretty mouth was forming. “I only know because I asked him to look for it.”

“Studies of the Revenant,” Rey read aloud from the piece of paper. She examined the call number and then turned to look behind her desk. “I’m sure I can find it.”

“Would you mind?” She looked back at him, and Poe’s eyes were doing that seriously absurd crinkled-at-the-corner thing. “If it’s not too much of a bother.”

“No!” Rey said, her fist almost crushing the piece of paper in her haste to start helping. “No, that’s not a problem at a—” The phone rang shrilly, and she sighed. The assistant librarian wouldn’t be in until one, so she was on desk duty. “After this,” she corrected, wincing. “If that’s okay.”

“I’ve got all the time in the world,” Poe said soothingly, his rich tenor pleasantly washing over her. Rey nodded and blushed, and then the phone rang again, startling her out of her Poe-induced stupor.

“Right, I should—Jakku Public Library, this is Rey speaking. How may I assist you?” She lapsed into her most polite Phone Voice, and she smiled at Poe, who – well, crap, he winked at her before settling in the stool across her desk. “Um…we close at 5 p.m. today,” she informed the confused patron. “No, no, the website can definitely be confusing. I think our hours are listed on Google too, though—gotcha. Yes! I’ll be here all day. Thanks for calling!” She hung up and tapped her hands on the desk for a second, struggling to keep her nerve.

“ _Revenant_?” Poe said quietly, breaking her concentration.

“Right!” Rey stumbled as she hopped down off her stool, and Poe reached out, looking concerned; she waved him off and then walked towards the local collection behind her desk. “It should be back here!”

The collection was an oddity, volumes and tomes on subjects and by people native to Jakku. It was an ancient little village, some buildings dating back to before the French had landed on English shores, and the library had some seriously old books that Rey shuddered to think of publication dates for. She helped maintain the rare collection as best she could – and even now, she fumbled with the key to unlock the glass-fronted case that kept some of the oldest books – but she couldn’t help but feel sometimes that these books would be better suited for a museum with the other old things.

Still, a patron needed it, so it couldn’t be unimportant, no matter Rey’s own personal feelings on the matter. She ran her fingers along the crumbling spines, peering at the faded letterings of each book before she found her prize.

 _Studies of the Revenant: The Eighteenth Century and Its Hallowed Protectors._ Weird. Rey shook her head and gingerly lifted the text from its spot, carrying it back towards her desk. Poe was still leaning against the counter, his chin now in his hand, and he perked up when she reappeared.

“Kenobi was in a rush,” Poe explained, his eyes wide and eager as she held out the book. “I didn’t want to bother him too much, but thank you most kindly, Ms. Smith.”

“It’s Rey,” she said shyly, smiling at him. Her nametag just said _R Smith_ , and she usually preferred the title he’d used when she was at work, but something about Poe made her want to bend the rules a bit. “…You can call me Rey.”

“Rey,” Poe said warmly, weighing the ancient book in his large hand. “Well, thank you, Rey.”

“Any time,” Rey said, blushing even more at his tone.

“Well, if you aren’t busy…” Poe lifted a list of book titles out of his pocket, and looked at her hopefully. It would probably take fifteen minutes to locate all of them –

_Fifteen minutes of uninterrupted smolder._

Rey cast a glance around the library – there were a few volunteers roaming the shelves, a couple kids in the YA section, and Ted still at his computer – and then grinned at Poe. “Let’s get to work.”

They walked around the shelves in as logical a pattern as possible. Rey couldn’t help but notice the books were all centered around local history, the occult, or …

“Serial Killers of the Nineteenth Century,” she said, refusing to allow any judgment to slip into her tone. It was not a librarian’s job to question to reading habits of their patron, after all.

“I promise I’m not crazy,” Poe mumbled, adding the book to his basket when she handed it to him. “I swear, I’m just—”

“Are you writing some kind of dissertation?” Rey asked blithely, already moving on to the next item on their list, _Churchyards of Jakku._

“Yeah,” Poe said, dragging the word out as he followed her down the aisle. “Yeah, something like that.”

She grabbed the book, surging up on her tip toes to reach it, and her cheeks heated once more at the draft of air that brushed across her lower back. She’d forgotten that she was wearing a jumper and loose trousers, and she prayed to God or whoever was listening that she didn’t just show off her underwear to the very cute, hopefully very single man standing next to her.

“I was wondering,” she said softly, holding the book in her hands for a moment, trying to figure out how best to phrase her question. “If you’d like me to show you how to use the online catalog?” She turned to him, and saw that he was staring at her thoughtfully. The book was handed over, and she tugged on the end of her ponytail, twisting it around her finger. “You know, it might make your life easier.”

“I don’t mind doing things the hard way,” Poe said, and while it was an innocuous enough answer to her suggestion, Rey felt like the wind had been knocked out of her. It was as though the very air between them had evaporated, and they were drifting together like objects in space – “I prefer to be…hands on.”

Yeah, she was going to swoon. Rey couldn’t ever remember feeling this dizzy, not even when she’d been dropkicked during a kickboxing class a few years back. Somehow, she managed to squeak out a semblance of a response before Ted popped up at the end of the aisle and summoned her services elsewhere.

She sat with the older gentleman for quite some time, working through various methods of accessing photo files, and when she finally stood up, Poe was immersed in a stack of books, not looking her way at all, only ever pausing to scribble in a leather-bound book open on the table in front of him.

When she scanned his books that evening before he left, she couldn’t help but peek at his last name.

_Dameron._

Mr. Smolder’s full name was Poe Dameron. And as she closed down the library that night, Rey tried not to smile too giddily at the fact that they’d had almost an entire conversation in the quiet safety of her library.

***

At 4:40 in the afternoon, Poe collected his things, sweeping his books and records of the day’s research into his satchel. He smiled one last time at the librarian, who waved at him before finishing with a different patron. Pausing at the edge of circulation, he took a quiet, stolen moment to look at her unhindered.

She was a thing of magnificence, and he’d been coming to this tiny library almost every day the last six months just for a glimpse of her. Instead, he’d gotten assistance, conversation, and a strange tug in his gut that whispered to him that this young woman – _young,_ he reminded himself, _far too young for you_ – was someone…important.

As the afternoon light shone down on her while she scanned books and idly chatted with a middle-aged woman, Poe was struck with the knowledge that she had absolutely no idea how entrancing she was, how bewitching, how utterly and completely beautiful she looked when she was doing what she loved. The way her nose crinkled when she read a page of a book she liked, the light in her eyes when she was able to help someone, the shifting expressions of her face while she ran through even the most basic administrative tasks in the library – she was incandescent, and Poe had somehow forgotten to be wary of the light.

He walked from the warm entrance of the library and crossed the stone street, autumn leaves skittering around his feet; a distinct chill had descended over the day, one Poe could almost feel, and the ghost of the man he used to be shivered in response to the changing weather. It would be cold tonight, cold for humans at least, and with the sky above unmarred by clouds and the crispness of the evening air setting in, Poe knew it would be an uncommonly bright night, the kind where the moon threatened to outdo the sun and replace him.

Poe looked over his shoulder once, twice, and then ducked into an alley across from the library. He jumped up on a fire escape, and then easily climbed the stones jutting out from the side of the bakery that was right across from Ms. Smith’s workplace. He settled in on the roof of the building and gazed at the front of the library, his chin in his hand and his mind on the librarian.

Rey Smith. He’d already learned her name, of course, but now that it had been given to him, the headiness of it threatened to overtake him. _Rey_. Named for the sun, no doubt. She was so blindingly bright, a flare of happiness and strange, dormant power – he wondered if she knew. He thought back to earlier today when she’d almost fallen off the stool at her desk. No, she probably had no idea what her history was, what the books behind her would tell her if she just looked –

But he couldn’t push it. And even if she never realized the truth of what she was, her existence was still far too valuable to neglect: it was why he found himself crouching on the roof of a building at a quarter past five on a Monday afternoon in a bloody backwater village in the middle of nowhere, England.

He had to protect her. Poe didn’t know much about Rey, other than the obvious details and what he had gleaned from their precious, few conversations – but he did know her life was something to defend, and he knew that there were forces at play in this ancient, crumbling village that were all too interested in her as well.

 _You’re the one stalking her from the roof,_ his mind calmly pointed out. Poe snorted and shook the thought off. He was here for a reason, and the reason was her continued existence. It wasn’t for personal gain. He didn’t even smile when he watched her, not at the random, sweet things she did, the way she played with her hair, or straightened her jumper, or fidgeted with her keys – he didn’t even laugh when she often broke into skipping on her walk home, thinking no eyes on her. No, he remained stoic and impassive, a damned gargoyle overlooking the small town, guarding all lives, but focusing on one in particular.

At five past the half hour, the lights turned off inside the library, and the door opened one last time. Poe watched with anxiety building in his gut as Rey exited the building, locking up behind her. _“Don’t turn your back,_ ” he hissed, staring down the street and at the adjacent rooftops. “ _Go right to your car._ ” He couldn’t have convinced of her anything if he were standing right next to her, he knew.

Rey Smith was resistant to glamour.

He’d never met a human like that before: he’d also never used his glamour for nefarious purposes, preferring to send humans away from dangerous situations, or convince people they had not seen a thirtysomething man with raven, curling hair stab another man who’d screamed demonically before fading to ash. But, when Rey had let slip that she’d had a run-in with Ren…

_“It was the weirdest thing,” she whispered to him, pushing the shelving cart. She looked nervous, and Poe’s heart would have fluttered, had it still moved._

_“Do you wish to talk about it?” Poe asked, cursing the fact that they weren’t truly friends, that she didn’t know him enough to seek him as a confidante. But she had looked so shaken that day in August, that he’d walked up to her, breaking every rule he had about distance and space and Rey’s safety, and asked after her weekend._

_She paused with the cart in front of the books on Cooking, and set a few recipe books in place, her bottom lip delectably between her teeth – no, Dameron, focus._

_“There was a man,” she said slowly, her hand trailing down the spine of Julia Child’s bestseller. “I bumped into him at the grocery store, and he made me laugh. He asked me to get coffee.”_

_Ah. She’d met someone. She looked so tired and pale because they’d spent the weekend – no. Don’t torture yourself. Eternity’s done that well enough. Rey continued speaking, unaware that she might have just killed Poe for the second time._

_“It got … really weird.” She had frozen, and Poe’s attention shifted faster than a peregrine falcon. Rey’s arms were wrapped around her middle, and not for the first time, Poe noted how woefully thin she was, how her arms looked as though he could wrap his hand around the thickest part and still have his fingers touch._

_A bizarre reality, to be someone of his kind who met a woman and whose major thought was then **feed her,** and not **feed.**_

_“Weird…how?” Poe asked softly, and he was suddenly thankful for the warm enclosure of the library shelves, the way the books rose out of the ground and seemed to tower around them specifically for the purpose of protecting the delicate frame which housed a potent spirit who stood before him._

_“He started to ask really invasive questions,” Rey pushed the cart a little further and moved on to some more books, her cheeks pink as she spoke. “Just. Weird. And then – he asked…” she made a face and sighed. “I hadn’t even been on a date in **three** years.” How could that be possible? Poe wondered desperately. Were mortal men so stupid?_

_Rey looked at him thoughtfully, and then squirmed with an expression of embarrassment. She didn’t look at him as she finished the story. “He invited me to…join him? In the bathroom? He phrased it very weirdly. Like, ‘you **will** join me in the restroom.’ And then he just got up from the table and went back there. So, of course, I grabbed my purse and ran. Now, I keep getting this weird feeling that someone’s watching me, and I’m looking over my shoulder, and God, I’m sorry to dump this on you, that’s not very professional—”_

_She looked heartbreakingly worried, and Poe rushed to comfort her. “No! No, I asked, that’s – that’s terrible. That’s really terrible. I’m sorry he made you feel so unsafe.”_

_“He really did.” Her smile was ragged around the edges, and Poe’s protective streak roared to life once more. But her next words threatened to knock him on his ass. “I should have known. His name was Kylo. What the hell kind of name….”_

_Her words were lost to the screaming in his ears, and she frowned at him with concern, clearly having reached the end of her side of the conversation._

_“You’re sure?” Poe asked breathlessly. “You’re absolutely sure that was his name? And – and he asked you to leave the table, the way you described?”_

_“Word for word.” Rey still looked concerned, and Poe managed to bring their talk to a more suitable conclusion, somehow, his mouth on autopilot while his mind whirred with what she had just told him._

He wasn’t sure what the First Order’s princeling wanted with the local librarian, but the fact that she seemed completely impervious to the old magic, combined with the knowledge of Ren’s track record with women, and vulnerable women at that, Poe wasn’t inclined to find out.

But Kylo Ren had tried to _glamour_ this woman into submission. She’d had no idea of the danger she’d been in, just confiding in a strange man over another strange man (Poe’s heart broke with the implication that Rey Smith just didn’t have that many people to confide in, that she had been so frightened for days with no one to tell, and she’d trusted _him_ somehow, all because he’d shown her a second of kindness – if he hadn’t taken an oath, he’d burn this whole world down for her), completely unaware that she could have been attacked, or killed, or worse.

Shaking himself from his reverie, Poe watched as Rey walked down the street, her hands tucked into the pockets of her trousers – she should be wearing gloves, honestly, but no, not his place, she was her own person, he couldn’t just pop up at her workplace tomorrow with gloves, maybe in a green or an orange – and followed her stealthily along the rooftops, his eyes seeking out the dark corners she was electing to ignore. Right as she turned on the street for her house, Poe leapt from the buildings of roofs and stuck to the shadows of trees, outside the periphery of her vision.

Her street was thankfully a straight shot, and Poe could see clear to the end of its mile run. She was almost to her door when he saw the movement. “ _Get inside,_ ” he hissed. “ _Now._ ” Rey fumbled with her post, pausing at the outskirts of the threshold of safety. _“Inside the garden wall,_ ” he urged her. _“And don’t let anyone in._ ”

Rey stopped and waved at someone across the street, a shy smile on her face. Poe sighed and stepped out from the shadows, fighting the urge to sprint to her gate – she could still make it, and there was no need to expose himself at the moment – but her attention was caught by what sounded at this distance like a very hearty meow.

She turned and laughed, waving one last time, and stepping onto her property, the gate slamming shut behind her. Poe was flooded with relief, but he kept creeping forward, his eyes focused on the shadow that had moved and threatened the librarian.

As he passed her yard, undetected by human eyes, made invisible by shadow, he spotted a handsome, black cat sitting on her front stop, grooming itself. He paused and frowned at it, and a second later the cat looked up and locked eyes with him.

A gentle hiss started in the beast’s throat as it eyed Poe warily, seeing right past his concealment, glittering green eyes carrying a distrust that bordered on the aggressive. Fair enough.

Poe kept walking towards his real destination, but he scheduled some time later in the evening to mull over the fact that Rey Smith had a witch’s familiar as a guardian. _Which witch sent it?_ Poe wondered, even as he crept up towards an alley, a dark break in the houses.

There. He spotted his quarry, and lunged forward at an untraceable speed.  He gripped the shadowy figure around the neck, forcing his head and therefore teeth up and away from him, and dragged him into the alley, hissing and spitting.

“What do you want with her?” Poe demanded, throwing the figure into the opposite wall. Dust and dirt shook loose from the power of the movement. “Why are you here?”

“Lord Ren sends his regards,” the thing that was once human purred, thin lips pulled over exposed teeth that were more snarl than smile. “And he wants his prize.”

“She’s not a prize.” Poe moved swiftly once more, his hand wrapping around its throat and slamming it backwards once more. His face twisted with revulsion at the sneering laughter that burbled under his palm. “And Ren has no claim to her.”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” it laughed still, and Poe’s hand tightened compulsively, a fact that would matter more if this thing could breathe. “You can kill me, but we’ll keep coming until she’s down below.”

“The first part of that sounds good,” Poe commented lightly, reaching into his satchel for the wooden stake. He plunged it into the left side of its chest and prayed whichever villagers heard the inhuman scream of agony that emitted from its twisted mouth would assume that a dog had gotten sick or a fox was in heat.

Poe felt incredibly uneasy as he stared at the pile of ash. He didn’t need to stay here all night – in the last month of surveillance, it hadn’t taken long for him to realize Rey never went out, content to sit in her front window and read until a late hour – as she didn’t seem the kind of woman to grant entrance into her home to strangers, and creepy ones at that. But, the dogged pursuit of her by the First Order set his teeth on edge. He stepped away from the alley, casting one last, suspicious glance up and down Rey’s street, and then turned and headed toward his current lodgings, halfway across town from Rey Smith’s home.

He was greeted at the door by Bebe, his sweet ghostly dog, who faded in and out as he wound around Poe’s legs. “Good boy,” he praised him lightly, patting the hound on what used to be his nose. “Best boy.” Bebe barked in agreement and followed Poe to the living room, made cozy with knitted throws and rugs. He settled in on the couch, placing his feet on the coffeetable – handmade three hundred years ago, and refurbished by Poe every now and then – and cracked open his journal.

His entry for today spiraled quickly away from his concerns of the First Order and towards his fascination with Rey Smith. He had a hunch about her parentage, her ancestry, but he needed more time, more research, and more conversation with the woman before he knew for sure. As it was, he had a sinking suspicion that the reason he thought she was important to the universe was because she was important to him.

Sometime in the last six months, most likely after the last month of protecting her from the shadows, collecting her smiles and thoughtful comments in the library, and watching her as often he could without it seeming invasive, he’d fallen for her. Disastrously so.

Poe closed his journal and sat stone still on his couch for almost an hour, lost in thought.

***

On Tuesday, Rey’s favorite patron (not that she should have favorites, but still), came in later than normal, and she swore he looked a little drawn and pale. It was odd – in half a year, she couldn’t remember a day where he didn’t look exactly the same. Hearty, hale, tan, with a devastating smile, and that damned smolder.

No smolder today, though.

She was staring at him across the reference desk when a rolled-up newspaper made contact with her skull.

“Ow!” She exclaimed in surprise. Ben Kenobi stood there, one hand on his hip, a white eyebrow lifted mischievously.

“Shhh,” he admonished her, his eyes darting to the _quiet, please!_ sign across the room. Rey rolled her eyes, and looked out apologetically at the patrons, one in particular.

Poe was settling back in his seat, his hands balled into fists. _Had he been worried about me?_ Rey thought wildly. It looked as though he’d risen from his seat when she cried out in surprise. _Was he going to defend me against Ben and his newspaper?_

“It’s almost lunchtime,” Ben reminded her cheerfully. “And I ordered some food for us.”

“That’s great!” Rey beamed at the older librarian who was, perhaps, the only real friend she’d ever had. The fifty year age gap didn’t bother her in the slightest. “You didn’t have to do that, let me pay you—”

“If you try to pay me, I shall scream,” Ben informed her. He tapped her on the nose with his paper, and Rey’s nose wrinkled at the smell of the newsprint combined with the action. “I got plenty, though, you can even take home some leftovers.”

A exhausted looking university student trudged up to the desk, clutching a book list, and Ben trotted off to help him. Rey smiled at his retreating form, and then looked back over her desk – her heart thudded in her chest to see Poe Dameron standing there, staring at her…hungrily?

“Are you okay?” She blurted out, immediately cursing herself for her rudeness.

“I’m fine,” Poe waved a nonchalant hand. “Are you?” His look was inscrutable, and Rey nodded, leaning over the counter to peer into his (handsome, so stupidly handsome) face.

“I’m doing great,” Rey assured him. On some bizarre whim, she added, “It’s easy to do well when you’re talking to your favorite patron.”

“Favorite?” Poe’s voice lowered what seemed like an octave, and _yes, there it was_ – the smolder. “You don’t say.”

“Mhm.” Whatever confidence had seized her sprinted out the door, leaving Rey halfway over the counter, leaning forward, her attention trained on soulful, brown eyes, and soft, pink lips. “I do say.”

“Well,” Poe drawled the word out, and he leaned forward as well. Not even half of foot of space existed between their noses, and this honestly, truly could not be professional. “If that’s true…what are you doing—”

“Food’s here!” Ben Kenobi came out of _nowhere,_ and Rey almost shrieked for the second time that day. She laughed nervously and sat up, blinking, her head clearing from Ben’s appearance and the delicious aroma from the takeout bags he dropped unceremoniously between Rey and Poe. “Eat up.”

“Will do,” Rey said, smiling at her mentor. She turned to apologize to Poe (and hopefully hear the end of that sentence), but she frowned at the sudden change in his expression.

Poe was backing away, looking – horrified? Disgusted? Terrified? – staring at the bag of food.

“Not a fan of Italian?” Ben asked cheerfully. “So sorry, I’ll put this in the back office. Excuse me.” He brushed past Poe, the bag gently tapping him in the shin on the way by. Poe made the oddest noise, almost like a hiss of pain, his expression now fully panicked.

“Mr. Dameron?” Rey asked softly. “Are you sure you’re—”

“I need to go,” he barked, and she blinked in surprise. “Now. Sorry.” He grabbed his things, throwing them in his bag, and he stacked up the books he’d pulled in a neat pile. “I’m so sorry, could you—” he gestured at the books and stormed out of the library.

“What?” Rey whispered, eyes wide. It had all happened in less than a minute – their charged moment, Ben’s appearance, Poe’s disappearance – and her mind was reeling as she hopped down from her seat and went to collect his books and place them on the shelving cart.

After lunch, she finished a few projects. An hour before her shift ended, she returned to the cart and began to replace the books around the library, as there were no volunteers today. She paused at the midway point of Poe’s pile of books, which had been heaped at the end before she went to eat. There, between all his research, was a leatherbound book that was certainly not in circulation. It was Poe’s own book, the one he took notes in.

It looked fairly expensive, and he always had it, so it had to be important to him – Rey flipped open the front cover to see if there was a telephone number or address listed.

Instead, she saw beautiful drawings and strangely attractive handwriting, loops and spirals unlike any cursive she’d ever seen outside of a primary document from long-forgotten centuries. She scanned the first few lines, just to decipher the complex script out of curiosity, and she found herself deeply, deeply engrossed within seconds.

“I’m going to take a small break,” she announced to the nearly deserted library.

“Okay!” Ben shouted back distantly from his office. Rey settled into the soft couches in the reading section, and began to flip through the pages, reading a heartbreaking account of a damned creature whose only mission was to use his version of eternity to protect the innocent, to walk the earth and rid it of those who sought to oppress. The tyrannical forces that worked in opposition to the light were called _The First Order,_ a truly evil group of the undead who loved to enslave and conquer, and had for thousands of years. They were lead by a vampire named Snoke, older than most civilizations, and sowed seeds of discontent and chaos throughout the corners of the world.

The narrator was part of a group called the Resistance, immortals pledged to the protection of what was good and right, formed from the pieces of an older rebellious organization that had struggled against empires and imperial conquests for centuries, long ago. The narrator was written with such breathtaking clarity, that Rey found herself wiping away a tear before she’d even read ten pages. _The way he’s suffered,_ she bemoaned, her hand tracing the passage about his days-long torture by a former friend. _How the world’s been so cruel to him –_ she felt an odd kinship to the lonely creature, who had colleagues and a few acquaintances, but typically found himself doing work for the Resistance by himself, seeking out information for them and returning only once every few years to the place where faces were familiar.

She startled when Ben made the announcement that the library would be closing in half an hour, and Rey leapt up apologetically. Ben shrugged and smiled at her, patting her on the shoulder before they divvied up the evening tasks.

Rey fought the urge to read more of Poe’s book – she had no idea he was such an incredible writer, and it only made him more attractive – not wanting to be more invasive or ruin his privacy to a further extent. She felt a little guilty that she’d read those pages, that she’d opened something that wasn’t hers to open, but still…Rey was engrossed by the ideas in the book even as she and Ben locked up for the night, to the point that she didn’t protest when Ben insisted on driving her home.

“You don’t know what’s out there,” he muttered darkly, almost to himself.

“I beg your pardon?” Rey asked, tucking the book safely into her work bag. It just hadn’t seemed right to leave it in the lost and found.

“Nothing, nothing,” Ben smiled at her as they drove down the drowsy, dark street. “I’m just an old man who worries, is all.”

“Mhm,” Rey nodded and stared out the window. “I don’t mind it when you worry over me.” She really didn’t, and the silence that passed between them then was companionable and comforting. Rey wondered to herself if this was what having a father was like, but she shook her head against the thought, for it threatened to make her throat close up with tears.

Once she’d stepped out of the car, she waved Ben a fond farewell outside her house, and walked up to her gate. Rey paused for just a moment, the back of her neck prickling. Bens’ car was idling behind her on the street, seemingly waiting for her to walk inside before pulling away, but – there was definitely someone else watching her.

Rey scanned the street anxiously but found nothing. She laughed at herself – looking in the shadows after reading a book on vampires, typical, really – and then walked inside her gate after one more wave to Ben.

Her dreams that evening were punctuated by sharp teeth, dark shadows, and warm brown eyes.

***

Poe nearly took out half the village on his sprint to the library the next day. He had _lost_ it, how had he been so careless? The food the old man had brought it was pungent, to be sure, the reek of garlic enough to force Poe away before that damn bag had bumped up against him, but – still. It had felt almost pointed, the fact that he met with garlic so coincidentally before he was about to ask Rey for…what, exactly? Some of her time? A dinner? A romantic evening? All things he didn’t deserve, couldn’t deserve, not when she…when he…

He tumbled through the doors, his hair no doubt a mess, his shirt not tucked and pressed as neatly as usual. He scented the air, a habit he tried to avoid in public, and caught only one person’s thriving, remarkable smell in the closed atmosphere of the library.

_There she was._

Rey Smith was staring at him already, up at her desk, her lovely cheeks tinted the most sinful, seductive pink. Poe, already carried away by heightened emotion, fought the urge to demonstrate his full abilities, to sprint across the floor of the library and jump over the desk, to pull her against him and –

_No. Not like that._

“Sorry.” The nervousness of his laughter was entirely unforced. “I think I left –” he walked up to the desk as he spoke, and Rey’s cheeks darkened from pink to red. Poe violently pushed down his reaction to the visual display of Rey’s blood, which already called to him like so few mortals’ did.

“Your book?” Rey said shyly. She reached below her desk for a moment, and came up with his journal. Poe sighed with relief, relief that was quickly slain when she said, “I’m sorry, I was looking for a phone number to reach you at, so I opened it.”

“You what?” Poe asked more sharply than he intended. _Mortals cannot know of our existence,_ Leia had warned him. _And this means all loose ends need to be…tidied up._

That usually meant glamour. But Rey was woefully resistant to it.

“I only read a few pages,” Rey squeaked, looking terrified at whatever expression crossed his face. Poe tried to calm himself, and smiled at her tentatively. She looked relieved, so it must have worked, the attempt to appear human for a moment. “It was really good,” she continued in a deeply encouraging tone. “I had no idea you were working on a novel this whole time!”

“A novel?” Poe repeated, slowly, the sweet, sweet realization dawning on him.

“Yes!” Rey beamed and tapped her hand on the cover of the journal before extending it over the counter towards him. “I would have read the whole thing, but I didn’t want to, not without your permission. But it was _so_ well-written. I could feel the narrator’s agony, it was…unlike anything I ever read. The pain he’s gone through, the things he’s seen, just to bring a little more light in the world.”

“Thank you,” Poe said weakly, flattery wildly battling mortification in his chest. She’d seen right through him, but somehow missed the fact that—

Rey still held the book out over the counter. “I can’t wait for the sequel,” she said earnestly, her face lighting up with one of her too rare, genuine smiles.

Poe let his hand brush across the back of hers, lingering more than he should, more than he deserved, as he took back the leather-bound book. “Me either,” he murmured.


	2. All in a Sea of Wonders

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey and her mysterious patron continue their flirtations; after she finds another peculiar book for Poe, an incident sets in motion a strange reaction in her. It does, however, allow her to grow closer to the handsome bookworm.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaaand we're back.
> 
> I was super overwhelmed by the incredible response to this fic, so of course I had to write more! Thank you, everyone <3 <3 <3

Rey opened the doors to the library on October 21st, shivering from the now undeniable chill in the air. Damp and grey weather had rolled through the little village at Jakku and was clearly there to stay. Her jumper was layered over yet another jumper, and she’d spent some time the previous night patching the holes in her corduroys.

Reasonably, Rey knew she could afford to buy new pants now, but the hunger of her childhood lingered too much like an unfriendly ghost, always at her shoulder, reminding her of the discomfort of starving slowly in the face of uncaring adults. So, she pulled out her sewing kit, piled together her tools, and doctored her own books as much as possible, and if her pants had obvious patches, well, Rey was sure it was in style somewhere.

Stepping into the warm entrance, the young librarian took a deep, comforting breath before flipping on the lights, setting her bag down, and going to check on their potted plants, which dotted the entry way. Hearty and attractive perennials were her next item of business – she spent some time with each one, checking their soil moisture and leaf colour, adding water here and there, and murmuring encouragements when needed. She liked to think they perked up when she praised their pinnate leaves or chlorophyll production, and at the very least, it gave her a sense of companionship before she finished the rest of her morning tasks.

By the time the general public wandered in, Rey’s stomach was gurgling, an unpleasant reminder that she had missed breakfast that morning. She rounded the corner towards reference while balancing fifteen books in her arms – sore from yesterday’s workout – and almost ran smack into a familiar face.

“Good morning,” Poe Dameron greeted her, a curious smile on his face.

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry,” Rey said, eyes wide. Poe flinched a little bit – had she actually hit him? – but waved an airy hand at her.

“Not to worry,” he said smoothly. “Not to worry. I was actually looking for you.”

“Oh.” Rey knew she was blushing, but he didn’t comment on it; she thanked the universe for not allowing mind-reading to become part of evolution, as she’d have no way to hide her (more than) crush on him if he could flip through her thoughts. Rey hadn’t had any inclination for romance her entire life, not unless the man’s name was Darcy, and he could be found safely tucked away in the pages of her book – but Poe Dameron had changed all that, and some long dormant part of herself had stirred to life the last month or so. Now, she was very much afraid that she was very much on her way to being very much in love with the man.

Speaking with Poe had become a regular occurrence, as they’d spoken more and more since she’d discovered his manuscript. He often let her pick his brain over the narrator’s motivations (and the shy, almost exhausted way he viewed his narrator, almost like a close friend who was he exasperated with yet loved, was utterly endearing), and he would always retire after their conversations back to his stack of books, back to his leatherbound draft of his entrancing novel. Rey would then find every possible excuse to gaze at him across the library, thankful that he rarely looked up, thankful that he missed the wistfulness in her stares.

“Are you free to talk?” Poe asked politely. Rey nodded and shifted the stack of books she was caring. “Ah, how rude of me. May I assist you?”

“Yes, please,” Rey sighed with relief when Poe took half her stack gingerly, and they walked side by side to the reference desk. “Thank you so much.” She smiled as winningly as she could, praying it was even a quarter as dazzling as his smallest smile. “You’re my hero.”

“Don’t say things you can’t mean,” Poe murmured softly, but when Rey raised an eyebrow at him, he shook his head and smiled ruefully. “Forgive me. I actually brought you something.” He opened his satchel and lifted out a bag with her favorite bakery’s logo on the front.

“You shouldn’t have,” Rey said, already grabbing the bag with wide eyes. The mouthwatering aroma was intoxicating as she took a deep breath in.

“Did you eat breakfast this morning?” Poe teased her, and Rey wrinkled her nose.

“No.” She dragged out the word. “I can’t believe you manage to realize that I haven’t eaten breakfast before I do. It’s wild, really. How are you so responsible, anyway?”

“It helps to be this old,” Poe said solemnly. Rey eyed him with her nose still wrinkled.

“You’re ridiculous,” she decided. “You can’t be a day over 35.”

“How flattering,” Poe said, his hand lifting, drifting in the direction of her face. Rey froze – was he really going to touch her? She really, really wouldn’t mind – and Poe did too, looking shocked. “Sorry, you have—”

“Hair in my face?” Rey guessed, brushing her cheek. Sure enough, there was a strand loose from her bun. “I usually do.”

“It was inappropriate of me. I’m sorry,” Poe muttered.

“Don’t be,” Rey said softly, shuffling her feet and staring at the carpet. She could feel his eyes on her, and she bit her lip before hurrying the conversation along. “Did you – sorry, you said you wanted to talk about something? Is there something I can help you with?”

“Yes,” Poe’s eyes were large and sorrowful when she looked at him. “I was wondering if you could help me find this passage. I’m afraid I don’t know the name of the book.” He handed her a scrap of yellowed paper, an ancient photocopy of a more ancient book, and Rey frowned at it.

“This might take a while,” she said, squinting at the old-style type. “But I’ll do my best. Do you know the subject area?”

“The local occult scene,” Poe said, grinning breezily at her arched eyebrow. “I know, totally new for me.”

“Totally. And how is our narrator?” Poe startled slightly, and she cocked her head at him. “I’m assuming this is for your manuscript?”

“Ah, yes.” Poe nodded, a strange expression crossing his face, his thumb nervously rubbing the edge of his soft leather jacket. “He’s…well, I was wondering if I could pick your brain over a decision.”           

Rey rested her elbow on the tall desk and leaned in. “I’d love that. Pick away!”

Poe didn’t smile like she hoped he would; instead he straightened out his jacket and dragged his hand through his hair – she noticed that his hair, long and curly as it was, was half-up today, pulled back from his face. He looked like an incredibly dreamy pirate, or shepherd, or some other model used for the front cover of a romance novel. Rey shook herself internally to dispel the very tempting image.

“My narrator,” Poe said in a low voice. “He … well, he might be written into a corner.”

“What do you mean?” Rey asked, propping her head up on her hand. She frowned thoughtfully, and Poe mirrored both her expression and her pose.

“It’s just…what if he wanted to do something, something that went against every oath he’d ever sworn. What if his whole time as a …”

“Vampire,” Rey supplied, when Poe seemed almost too embarrassed to say the word (she wanted to blame _Twilight,_ but then again, she wanted to blame _Twilight_ for a lot of things).

“Yes. His whole existence as a vampire has been dedicated to his cause. And this thing that he wanted…this reality he wanted for himself, a future – something he never thought he could have – well, it would be selfish. Terribly selfish.” Poe looked agonized, and Rey wondered if his mildly disheveled appearance today had something to do with staying up late making notes on his manuscript. It was oddly endearing to envision. “Should he?”

“Would it make him happy?” Rey asked, her brow furrowing as she thought back to all the pain and torment suffered by the narrator in the book.

“I – yes. Yes, it would.” Poe examined her face thoughtfully, almost too closely, as though he were hoping to find some deep untold secret there. Rey gazed back as steadily as she could, well aware that they were once again leaving behind the realm of ‘appropriate workplace behavior’ as they retreated once more into the bubble they so often found themselves in.

“Well, I’d say your narrator deserves to be happy,” Rey said with finality. Poe strangely looked more tormented, so she pushed forward with her questions. “And…while it might not be totally aligned with his cause…would it _hurt_ anyone? For him to do what he wanted?”

“It might not,” Poe admitted in a low voice that made her shiver. His eyes flickered downward – he _couldn’t_ be staring at – “But it might hurt the one person he’s come to…care about. And he wouldn’t be able to live with himself if she were hurt because of him. I don’t know if… he could take that risk.”

Rey opened her mouth to ask another question, but she shut it again, another shiver coursing down her spine. It needed to be asked, though: “I mean, she’s a person too, this character he cares about. So, what if she were okay with it? The risk?”

The intensity of the moment flared, and Rey felt like they were celestial bodies careening towards each other. The public space around them disappeared, and it was as though their very spirits were spiraling, circling each other, assessing, as Poe’s eyes searched hers, and she searched his.

He broke the dizzying quiet between them, his voice low and urgent. “Rey, there’s something—”

“Rey!” Another familiar voice called. She startled and turned to see Ben Kenobi waving at her merrily from circulation. “Sorry dear, the computer is busted again. Could you please come fix it?”

“Coming, Ben!” Rey called. She looked back at Poe and smiled ruefully, more so when she saw the distance had grown between them once again. Poe had pulled back, his eyes downcast. “We can talk more later?” The strand of hair was back in her face, and it tickled her cheek, a vaguely irritating feeling.

“I need to go somewhere this afternoon,” Poe said, regret lining his face and his voice. “Maybe tomorrow, then.”

“Tomorrow,” Rey repeated, her smile small but no less genuine. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Poe.”

“Rey.” He did reach out and tuck her hair behind her ear then, and his touch was like a brand, burning into the core of her. Rey watched him walk away before she turned and walked towards Circulation to help Ben Kenobi and his woefully poor timing.

Poe was gone by the time she got back from helping Ben (which took a bizarrely long time, and eventually she realized that one of the cords connecting it to the internet had been severed, as though with scissors. Ben claimed complete and total innocence), but Rey did dedicate the last hour of her shift to finding his requested book.

 _Shadowed Pasts: The Dark Crossroad of Jakku_ was the full title, and Rey stroked the spine delicately as she carried it up front to record the call number. The world outside was entirely dark now, a bitter wind rattling the nearly vacant branches that brushed up against the wall of windows in the Children’s section. Rey cracked open the book gingerly and frowned at the lack of a call card. “Typical,” she muttered, pulling out a fresh one. She began to fill it out, her thumb still stroking the impossibly thin pages of the book.

Out of sheer curiosity, she turned to a random page in the middle of the thick tome and began to read.

It was…well, it was weird. She’d had a hunch that her small town had been the site of some weird things even before Poe Dameron started hunting down strange manuscripts in her collection, but this was…terrifying. Drawings she really could do without littered the pages, foul depictions of gruesome acts and transformations. Perturbed, and wondering what the hell Poe wanted with this book, she turned another page.

There was a lengthy spell in what appeared to be Latin – but also not quite Latin – above a bizarre black spot on the book. It didn’t look like the editor’s choice at all, but rather a hasty spilling of ink that had been thrown over the original image. Rey squinted at it, held it up to a book light, rubbed her finger gently over the ink – nothing.

Shrugging, she was about to close the book, when a peculiar instinct had her reading the words closely. She began to mouth the various sounds, pleased at her two semester Latin class she’d taken in her third year at university.

Perhaps it was the ancient glue of the book and its decaying stench, or perhaps it was squinting in the already low light, but Rey began to feel very light-headed as she continued to read aloud. She cleared her throat and read louder, her finger trailing along the page – an urge to intensely focus on the block of text overwhelmed her, and Rey leaned in closer and closer to the page until—

“Rey!” For the second time that day, Ben Kenobi called her name, but this time it was louder and sharper than before. She startled at it, and then startled again when she realized his hand was on her shoulder.

“Ben?” She looked up, her head aching now.

“Dear God, Rey.” Ben hastily reached over the counter of the reference desk and grabbed a tissue. “You’re bleeding—” He pointed at her nose, and Rey took the offered tissue and dabbed at it, frowning. Sure enough, a fairly copious amount of red covered the Kleenex when she pulled it away.

“Huh.” She shrugged. “Must be the dry air.” She shivered violently and wrapped her arms around her middle. “Are you going to turn the heat on tomorrow?”

“I turned it on today,” Ben said slowly. He pulled the book away from her and stared at it, a horrified expression on his face.

“Then why is it so cold?” Rey muttered, unable to focus on her fellow librarian’s bizarre reaction to the book she’d been reading.

“Why do you have this?” Ben demanded, drawing her attention back to him. Rey frowned, trying to remember. Hadn’t she just…found it? Then, she remembered.

“Poe Dameron requested it,” she said, clicking through her requests list on the computer to clear out her note for him. She squinted at the time. “Is it six already?” _Weird._

“Poe Dameron?” Ben repeated. “Poe, the one always in here staring at you, needs a haircut, Poe?”

“Yeah.” Rey powered her computer down after saving her progress on the circulation data. Ben was staring, aghast, at her when she looked back up. “Why—”

“What else has he requested you read?” Ben said, his expression downright ferocious now. Rey blinked, not quite comprehending. “Good Lord, you’re bleeding again—” Rey grabbed another tissue and pinched her nose shut this time. “What else?”

“Um,” Rey spoke through her closed nose. “He never asked me to read it at all. He just requested it, and I was curious, so I looked inside.”

“Are you sure?” Ben sat down heavily on the stool on the other side of the desk, gripping the counter tightly while he scrutinized her. “He never … asked you to do anything?”

“He asks me to help him find books,” Rey retorted primly. “It’s in our job description. Jeez, did he upset you somehow?”

“You could say that.” Ben stared at her for another moment and then shook his head. “Come on. Get that nose cleaned up, and then help me close up. I’m driving you home tonight.” Rey opened her mouth to protest, but Ben’s hand cut through the air. “No buts.”

***

Rey should have known her strange nosebleed would have lingering consequences – that evening around midnight,, she was standing in her living room, idly chatting to the black cat (which had Absolutely Insisted on coming in that evening) while straightening up her bookshelves when suddenly a fit of dizziness overcame her. She stumbled to the couch, the room growing black at the edges, her consciousness fading fast, and then she collapsed fully.

Later, she couldn’t even claim to have fainted, as she could remember her dreams, as confusing and disorienting as they were –

_A dark chamber with flickering lights –_

_A group standing in the shadows, watching her –_

_Rey standing on a dais alone, cloaked in red –_

_Cold, cold, the room was terribly cold, and while the congregation stared, it was only Rey’s breath which caught into fog –_

_A pair of eyes, brown eyes –_

_The wrong color brown._

She gasped awake and then coughed deeply, her chest rattling. Rey groaned and clutched her throat, burning oddly as though she were mid-strep. The clock on her mantle told her it was not yet 3:30 in the morning, but she was shivering too much to even roll off the couch and slouch to her bed. Instead, she tugged several quilts down off the back of the sofa and covered herself with them, trying to force the terrible vision of haunting, red-tinted brown eyes out of her mind.

Only when the black cat curled up on her side was Rey able to drift off to sleep, and in the morning, she managed to drag herself into work. The only reason she went in at all was Ben’s own reason for being out – he met with his bridge club every Monday, and Rey found the image of the old librarian hunkered down in someone’s study, barking about cards, and drink tea with brandy all too endearing to ruin.

An hour after lunch, Rey found herself sniffling, her chin tucked into her jumper, the sleeves pulled over her hands, curled up on her seat behind the reference desk. Rey prayed that no one whose opinion she cared about wandered into the library to see her with a red nose and bleary eyes, but of course, her prayer went unanswered.

“Are you feeling well?” Poe’s polite voice asked her, causing her to blink and look up from where she’d been staring at the grain of the wood.

“Um.” Rey coughed, a horrible rattling noise. “No. Not really. I’m sorry, I don’t want to infect anyone—”

“Nonsense,” Poe assured her kindly, and while it was normally ludicrous to look at how pretty he was, it was downright painful to look at him with a headache. “You won’t infect me. Very strong immune system.” He smiled as though they were sharing an inside joke, and Rey smiled back weakly.

“I have your book,” she said thickly, coughing into her elbow. “It’s right here. Just let me make sure I didn’t bleed all over it.”

“What?” Poe asked sharply. She looked up slowly from where she was digging around under the desk, her reactions slower than normal, but she swore his expression was _panicked._ “Did you – did you get hurt?”

“No.” Rey shook her head, laughing at herself as she set the book down carefully between them. “No, but it was the weirdest thing. I was…well, I was reading some of this aloud, and Ben pointed out that my nose started bleeding. It was terrible. I haven’t had a nosebleed since I played rugby in high school.”

“You what?” Poe asked, and Rey grinned at him, assuming he’d ask the normal _how did someone so skinny play rugby?_ (The answer, of course, was ‘ _violently_ ’). “You – why did you read it out loud?”

“You and Ben, honestly,” Rey muttered. “I just wanted to hear how it sounded. You know? That’s…that’s not that weird. Plenty of people do that when they read.”

Poe deflated and rubbed a hand over his face, looking suddenly exhausted. “No. No of course, you’re right. Sorry, it was rude of me to inquire.”

“You’re fine,” Rey waved a hand and then pushed the book closer to him. “You can have this all day though, I checked it out in your name.” She leaned away to sneeze violently, and then coughed again. “God. Sorry, I’m absolutely disgusting.” _You’re definitely never going to find me attractive now._ “Ugh, it started right after that damn nosebleed.”

“Out of curiosity,” Poe said, his fingers tracing the binding of the book. Rey had a sudden itch of a longing, a wish that he’d trace anything on her with the same care. “What passage were you reading when all _that_ started?”

“Oh.” Rey frowned and opened the book carefully, turning the pages until she got to the curious, blacked-out image. “That one.” Poe stared down at it, his eyes moving back and forth so quickly they almost blurred – Rey wondered if that were actually happening, or if she were about to pass out again – and then he looked up, concern in his eyes.

“Can you hold onto this for me? Just for an hour or so. I need to run an errand, but I’ll be back.”

“Yeah, sure,” Rey said, muffling a yawn in her sleeve. “Sorry, sorry. I’m being so rude today.”

“Do not say such things about yourself,” Poe ordered her gently, closing the book. “I’ll – I’ll be right back. And you’re feeling fine? There’s no one I can summon for you?”

“No?” Rey blinked at him, exhaustion creeping in at the corners again. “No, I’m fine.”

“Then I must take my leave.” Poe bowed to her, one hand in front of his waist, and one behind his back causing Rey to stare at him – she was definitely about to pass out again, wasn’t she? If she was hallucinating – and then she watched him rub his neck. He looked almost embarrassed, and she’d think he _was_ embarrassed, if only he’d been blushing. “I mean. See you.” He walked out of the library stiffly, his satchel smacking into the back of his legs with every step.

Rey busied herself for the next hour, helping patrons check out materials, organizing the magazine section, and updating the circulation data. By the time Poe Dameron returned, she believed herself to be not at all in danger of seeming like she had been waiting for him to come back – she’d made it a particular goal of hers to never to wait for anyone.

But there he was, hair loose and curly and magnificent, cheeks not even tinted by the cold, brown eyes wide and searching – when they landed on her, clear across the reading section, he seemed to settle, his shoulders relaxing and an easy smile crossing his full lips. In one hand, he held a small paper bag, and in the other, a to-go cup. He held both up, grin widening, and Rey managed a smile back through the general haze of looking at him. They walked towards each other, Rey rather slowly, and Poe quickly but appearing to hold himself back, almost as though he would sprint, if he could. In her mild delirium, Rey allowed herself the fantasy that she might be the kind of person Poe would sprint across a public space for.

“Here,” he said, once they were an appropriate distance apart. “This always helps me feel better.” He handed her the paper bag, and she saw that it was from the local apothecary, a small shop she’d written off as hipster nonsense a few years back. She opened the small parcel and sniffed – her sinuses trembled, and she blinked in surprise.

“Whoa,” she muttered, feeling her sinuses clear a little more.

“Yes, whoa,” Poe said. “Candied ginger. Good for what ails you.” He looked at her expectantly, and Rey looked around – no patrons were staring at them, as though unaware or uncaring that the local librarian had a terrifically inappropriate crush on one of them – before popping a cube onto her tongue. She blushed when she saw Poe staring at her, but she realized he was just waiting for her reaction.

The sharp bite of the ginger washed over her palette, and Rey coughed slightly as her congestion almost violently cleared. “This is just ginger?” She asked, waving her hand in front of her tongue. “What?”

“Mhm,” Poe held the mug out to her. “And I made this tea myself.”

“It’s not poisoned is it? You’re not trying to kill me?” Rey joked, but she immediately regretted it, as Poe looked stricken at the idea. “Um. Kidding.” She took a sip to placate him, and a strange feeling almost like a warm breeze rippled down her back. “What’s in this?”

“Secret recipe,” Poe said, more cheerful now. “How are you feeling?”

“Better,” Rey admitted, raising her eyebrows at how true it was. She realized just how exhausted she’d been, how drained. “God, you must be magic.”

Poe laughed, a single huff of sound. “Must be.” He smiled at her fondly, and Rey blushed again, holding the cup of tea close to her chest as she stared at the ground. “You’re looking more like sunshine again.”

“Sunshine?” Rey asked shyly, peeking up at him between her lowered lashes. Poe definitely was mortified now. He stared at his feet and started to stammer.

“I – I, it’s just – you know, your name…Rey… it sounds…well, it sounds like a ray of light, or sunshine, and uh, sometimes…sometimes I call you Sunshine in my head, and—”

“It’s sweet,” Rey assured him, reaching out to lay her hand on his arm, wondering if she was crossing a line. Poe froze, but he didn’t look upset, so she allowed herself to leave her hand where it was, cupping the very obvious muscle of his bicep over his leather jacket. “No one’s ever given me a nickname before.”

“No?” Poe asked, a tone of indignation in his voice.

“Nope,” Rey said cheerfully. And then, because she was clearly still addled from her sickness, Rey added, “But I have a nickname for you!”

_Shut up. Shut up! Shutupshutupshutup –_

“Oh?” Poe smiled pleasantly at her. “And what would that be?”

“Uh.” Rey stared at the ground again, fiddling with the cup in her hand. “Never mind.”

“Now you need to tell me,” Poe said. “Isn’t it a librarian’s job to share information with the public?”

“Gah!” Rey said, stamping her foot. She jabbed a finger at him, almost losing the bag of ginger in consequence for her rapid action. “Not fair!”

“Please?” Poe did the ridiculously unfair thing of batting his ridiculously long eyelashes at her, and Rey was hopeless.

“Fine.” She sighed and held her occupied hands in front of her face. “The Smolder.”

“The what now?” Poe asked, leaning in.

“The Smolder,” she whispered, mortified, hiding even more behind the things in her hands. “Alright? Oh, would you look at that, someone needs my help—” She almost sprinted away, thankful for the sudden resurgence of her energy. Rey only paused briefly at her desk to put down Poe’s gifts before running off to help the totally non-invented patron in the corner of the library, the one far, far away from handsome men and their sketchy research.

The library closed not even an hour after that, and Rey returned to her desk, still pink-cheeked, to pack up her things. She made the general announcement that the library would be closing in ten minutes, and then five, and soon she was walking over to lock the doors.

Rey startled when Poe materialized seemingly out of nowhere, from the direction of the vending machines and bathrooms. “You aren’t locking up by yourself, are you?” He asked, concern crossing his face.

“I usually do.” Rey fiddled with her keys, wondering how to make this sound more _professional_ and less _I’m kicking you out to avoid an awkward confrontation about how my nickname for you totally objectified you._ She eyed the door, but luckily, Poe took the hint, walking to the exit. He smiled at her over her shoulder.

“Can I walk you home? When you’re done?” She stared in response, and Poe’s smile faded slightly. “Or not, sorry – that was – that was forward of me. I apologize.”

“No!” Rey said so quickly it sounded like she had shouted it. “No! No that would be – sorry, still feeling sick, I guess, um – that would be lovely. Can you wait outside while I close up?”

Poe nodded, his smile returned full force, and pushed out the doors. Rey watched him go, and then stumbled around half-blind from her eagerness to be back outside. She had no idea where Poe’s chivalry had come from, but she wasn’t going to stare a gift horse in the mouth. Rey forced herself to double and triple check the quality of her closing duties, as she was worried she’d missed, oh, all of them in her haste to be outside with Poe.

Before she flipped off the lights in the office and turned off the heat for the night, she double-checked her own appearance. Her cheeks were flushed, and her eyes were bright, her freckles standing out even more than usual. Rey smoothed her flyaways down anxiously, wishing she’d taken a shower this morning instead of just spraying dry shampoo on her grungy roots after waking up late. “It’s just walking,” she hissed at herself. “Calm down.” She popped another ginger cube, chewing furiously and praying her new nosebleeds would hold off until after Poe had said goodnight, praying that he wouldn’t kiss her while she was still mucus-y (and where did _that_ idea come from? Why would he even want to kiss her? He probably just wanted to talk about his research).

Rey finally summoned the courage to leave the library, her jumper adjusted perfectly over her trousers, and her braid passably smooth. Poe was waiting patiently on the sidewalk out front, dapper as always in his leather jacket, now paired with a thick, knitted green scarf, and she lifted a hand in greeting. She giggled when he half-bowed again, giggling more when he caught himself, looking contrite and sheepish as he grinned at her. As she drew up to him though, his expression shifted to a frown.

“Do you have a coat?” Poe asked, eyeing her threadbare jumper worriedly. Rey shrugged.

“I usually just wear a lot of layers,” she muttered. “I’ve never actually owned a coat.” She jerked her head in the direction of her walk home, and they fell in step.

“Never? Did you live somewhere warmer when you were a child?” Poe asked, and Rey flinched.

“No.” She said it coldly, a scowl crossing her face before she could stop it. The wind whistled between them for a moment, and Rey hunched in on herself, her cheeks flaming again.

“I… I said something to upset you. I am very sorry,” Poe said, and Rey shook her head, irritated at herself for reacting so poorly.

“You didn’t,” Rey said softly. “At least, you wouldn’t have known. I grew up in the north, on the moors. It was very, very cold. Still, no jacket.” She laughed bitterly. “That would have cost money, you see, and I wasn’t worth the expenditure.” The dark memory of her lonely childhood threatened to overwhelm her, and Rey was cast backwards into an echo of Unkar’s rage, the pinch of starvation in her belly, the cold laughter of an evil—

She shivered, and Poe stopped walking. She stopped as well, her eyes lowered to avoid the pity that was surely in his face. “Here,” he said softly, and something warm was looped around her neck. Rey looked up in surprise to realize that he had taken off his green scarf to give her. When he was done draping it around her shoulders – Rey had to admit, she was much warmer with it – he cupped her chin, and her breath caught in her throat. “You are worth everything,” he said simply, after a long moment of gazing into her eyes.

Rey, who’d never made this much eye contact in her life, could only nod, and whisper, “Thank you.” Poe’s full lips twitched into a smile, and they resumed their walk towards her house.

“Your family,” Poe said, after a few minutes of quiet. Rey tensed but then relaxed. She realized she didn’t mind it so much, the idea of him knowing everything there was to know about her. Odd. “Do they still live up north?”

“No.” Rey shrugged and buried her face in the scarf briefly, inhaling the intoxicating blend of cologne, spice, and something distinctly masculine. “I don’t know where my family is, or who they were. I don’t even know what my real name is.” Poe looked over at her oddly, and Rey shoved her hands in the pockets of her trousers and shrugged again before continuing her explanation.

“My parents abandoned me,” she said softly. “When I was too young to remember them. I knew my first name was Rey, at least, that’s what I told the nice old couple who found me. They brought me to the station, and next thing I know, I’m placed…well, I suppose you could call it a home _._ With…some not so good people.” She looked at Poe finally and almost stumbled from the intensity of his gaze. “That’s why I’m ‘Smith.’ They just gave me a random name.”

“Thank you for sharing that with me,” Poe said, and Rey winced. God, he was never going to talk to her again. Not that she could blame him. “May I ask, why the library?”

“Oh.” Rey laughed and shook her head. “You’ll think it’s silly.”

“I highly doubt that.” His hand brushed against hers as they turned down the final street, and on a bold instinct, Rey slipped her hand through his elbow. He made no move to turn away, but he looked as surprised as she felt.

“You’re warm,” Rey explained, and he nodded, smiling. At it was true…sort of. The warmth coming from Poe seemed like it might be entirely in her own head, as it was both there and oddly not. “Anyway. I decided to be a librarian because books were my only escape growing up. I could read for hours and hours and choose any life I wanted, and the only people who never chased me away or told me I was nothing were librarians.” She was sure by this point she was bright pink, so she avoided Poe’s eyes again.

Her house was growing nearer, and so was Poe. “Who could ever convince you that you were nothing?” He asked, his voice low and urgent.

“Many people.” She smiled and looked at him out of the corner of her eye. “But it doesn’t matter now. I’m Rey, and that’s enough.”

“More than,” he assured her. His smile was back when she looked at him fully. “I’m sure anyone else would have kicked me out by now, with my predilection for the occult and murder.”

“Maybe,” Rey teased. “Maybe I’m just compiling notes to bring you down.”

“I’ll take that chance.” They arrived at her gate, and Rey came to a stop. She put a hand on her gate and reluctantly pulled her hand free from his arm.

“Thank you for walking me home,” she said quietly. “It’s odd…I usually feel…I’m not sure, but usually walking home I’m looking over my shoulder, worried about something awful happening. And I didn’t twice about it just now.”

“I was distracting you,” Poe smiled, and Rey pushed the gate open and stepped inside her front garden. Poe’s eyes darted down the street, but they were back on her face when she next spoke.

“No.” She stepped back out for a second and nudged him. “You were making me feel safe.”

Poe caught her hand and flipped it so her palm was facing upwards; and for the second time that evening, her breath caught in her throat as Poe bent his head and brushed his lips tenderly over her pulsepoint. “Goodnight,” he whispered, gazing up at her, still poised with his head near her hand.

“Goodnight,” she answered just as quietly. He straightened up and released her, and Rey stepped back inside her garden, the gate clicking shut behind her. They looked at each other for a long moment on either side of her property line, and then she walked towards her door, the presence of his eyes on her form almost a physical weight.

“And for the record, Ms. Smith,” Poe called out after her. She turned on the front step to smile at him. “I have an inappropriate nickname for you too.”

“And what’s that?” She called back, her hand on her doorknob. The black cat hurtled out of the shadows and wound around her feet, back arched and suspicious green eyes fixed on Poe. She laughed at it and then looked back at the handsome man standing at her gate.

“Beautiful.” And with that, he bowed, for the third time that day, and walked off into the night.

It wasn’t until he became part of the shadows that Rey even noticed she was still wearing his scarf.  


**

He heard the door to Rey Smith’s home click open and shut, and Poe relaxed, if only slightly. The unbearable sensation of being watched hit him again, and he continued to walk, his hand on the stake he always kept on the inside of his jacket. He took a risk and tipped his head back, his eyes fluttering shut for a moment, scenting the air – Poe forced himself to look past the lingering scent of _her,_ of jasmine petals and heat and something impossibly intoxicating – and his full body twitched when his nose hit something that was decidedly not vampire.

In fact, it smelled like—

Poe stiffened and tilted his head slightly, freezing in his tracks. “Witch,” he hissed. “ _Show yourself._ ”

“I don’t follow orders from your kind,” a soft, clipped voice answered. Poe turned fully to see the old man from the library step out of the shadows. “Good evening.”

“Good evening,” Poe answered through gritted teeth. “Ben, is it?” The old man inclined his head in acknowledgement, and Poe reluctantly dropped his hand from his stake. While elderly, the old man radiated power, as did his scent. A lousy wooden stake would do nothing against a witch of his caliber. “Why were you following me this fine evening?”

Ben examined him coolly, and then murmured something under his breath. Poe staggered slightly as his senses dulled, and sound grew muffled, and all the lamplights but the one they were under extinguished. “Forgive me,” Ben said, sounding as though he were speaking from a great distance. Poe’s ears popped, and he rubbed his jaw in irritation as sound came rushing back, as though he were rising up through water very quickly. “I don’t want eavesdroppers.”

“Fair enough,” Poe said warily. If he knew him better, he’d scold the witch for not asking permission before using magic. His best friend was half-warlock, after all, and Finn wouldn’t be caught dead breaking etiquette like that. They weren’t in conflict, Poe and the old man, there was no need to be _rude._ “So. Why were you following me?”

“Not you,” Ben corrected him, rubbing his greyed stubble thoughtfully. “Her. And I could ask you – what do you want with Rey Smith?”

Poe cleared his throat and stared back the way he’d came, wishing more than anything that she’d invited him inside, that even now he was still close enough to her warmth to feel alive again –

“Because, I should tell you. If you intend to corrupt her, to turn her into one of you—”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Poe snapped, turning to glare at the pesky old man. “My very spirit recoils from the idea. To curse her? The way I was cursed? To take away her agency, her life, her soul?” He spat over his shoulder, a relic of an older time, and glared at Ben, well aware that as his temper rose, his teeth were elongating, his eyes growing more feral. He knew he cut a fearsome figure when provoked, but Ben regarded him coolly.

“Alright.” He tilted his head to study Poe, who still heaved and struggled to maintain the scrap of humanity he possessed. “I believe you. I don’t know why, but I do.” Poe nodded and tried to settle down, his hackles still fully raised. “But if it is not to condemn her, why do you keep returning? Others at the library are starting to recognize you, to remember you. It is not like your kind to become involved with a human community like this.”

“I…” Poe cleared his throat. “I am researching the area for my … employers. The First Order is highly active here. We work in contradiction to their goals.”

Ben nodded. “A worthy cause. So you are Resistance, then?”

“Yes.” Poe eyed the circle around them, unable to see past the construction of darkness Ben had built. “And you? What are you?”

“I was once part of a coven of rebellious witches and warlocks.” Ben smiled fondly. “We were more active during the time of empires, though. The First Order is merely an off-shoot of their evil.”

“We are on the same side, then,” Poe said, relief coursing through him. He did not need to fight the old man, who, if he was correct, was Rey’s only friend here in Jakku. “You do not mind me continuing to use your resources?”

“I suppose not.” Ben regarded him, and then smirked, his face appearing much younger suddenly. Poe realized he was most likely a very handsome man in his youth – and by what he had just admitted, it was curious to wonder _when_ exactly Ben’s youth was. “As long as you admit it’s not just the research keeping you here.”

“What do you mean?” Poe asked warily, well aware already what Ben was saying.

“You love her,” Ben said, his keen blue eyes piercing through Poe’s core. He flinched from the examination, but forced himself to stand his ground. “Don’t you? It’s why you’ve been following her home, why you keep returning when she works, why you haven’t tried to attack me, even now.”

“I’m not an animal,” Poe said sourly, frowning at Ben’s final assertion. “I wouldn’t attack you either way. I do not enjoy fighting, nor killing. It was forced on me at the beginning, and now.” He shuddered, unable to continue.

“But you do not deny it,” Ben pointed out gently, and Poe scowled into the darkness. “It would be an unholy thing, you know, for a vampire to join with a witch.”

“She’s not a witch,” Poe said coldly, glaring fully now at the old man. He meant to add _I have no intention of joining with her,_ but Ben raised a silver eyebrow at him.

“What makes you so sure?” They stared at each other for an agonizing minute, Poe’s hands twitching as he struggled to remember his reason for not attacking peaceful beings. Ben was the one to sigh and break the silence again. “No matter what, it would be an unkindness to her, to draw her to you, only to leave her.”

“Why would I leave her?” Poe demanded hoarsely. “Why would I ever—”

“You will watch her die,” Ben said simply, and Poe felt as though the old man had reached inside his jacket, taken his own stake, and used it against him. His heart was cleaved in two, his mind rendered useless in light of the inescapable truth, his knees weak from it – “You will watch her die if you stay.”

“You think I don’t know that?” Poe whispered, his throat tight. Ben studied him, but Poe was staring back in the direction of Rey’s small cottage, unable to see through the artificial darkness outside their small ring of sight.

“It goes against everything I stand for,” Ben said, walking forward and placing a withered hand on his arm. Poe didn’t shrug it off; he resisted the urge to. “But…I am rooting for you.” He walked to the edge of the circle and looked at Poe over his shoulder. “Lor San Tekka. You should pay him a visit.” The name triggered a small memory, a brief flash of a conversation he’d had with Leia sometime during the first World War, but then Ben was crossing the threshold of their small enclosure –

The spell was broken, and sound and light rushed back into the street Rey Smith lived on.

And Poe was standing alone in the middle of it all.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next two chapters continue to flesh out the backstory and the conflict between the Resistance and the First Order - 
> 
> Should there be a fifth, very very smutty vampire chapter? Let me know!
> 
>  
> 
> (I should probably say as a full disclaimer that now I am an adult, I love Twilight as much as I hate it)


	3. Habentis Maleficia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With Poe out of town, Rey finds herself feeling oddly out of sorts. She makes a new friend - and Poe makes a startling discovery - before a random attack threatens to expose the secret of Poe's world once and for all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some violence and some cursing in this chapter 
> 
> And Kylo Ren being a Super Creep

_“Come back!”_

_She sprinted down the street, but her legs were too short to keep up with the disappearing figure; she stumbled to a halt, the shadows creeping in on her vision as her breath stuttered, broken by sobs. “Come back.”_

_She was alone. She has always been alone, and she tripped over the curb as she jumped out of the way of an oncoming car. Mama was gone - and so was the memory of her face. Her chest hurt from crying, her tummy hurt from hunger, the shadows leapt out at her -_

_“Why are you so sad, little one?” A deep, sonorous voice reached out in the darkness, and she took another shuddering breath, turning around._

_“I don’t - I don’t know where my mum went. Have you seen her?” Her lip quivered pathetically, but she forgot  her sadness as a peculiar sensation took over. She couldn’t find the source of the voice. “Where are you?”_

_“Your mother abandoned you.” The voice sounded angry on her behalf, and Rey sniffed, wiping her nose on her sleeve. “...I wouldn’t.”_

_“Who are you?” Rey’s nose wrinkled when she received no answer, but the next time she turned around, the street had changed. She was underground, it seemed, lamplight flickering on damp walls, a large black throne at the other end of a large hall. Next to it, another, slightly smaller throne._

_“I have been waiting for you.” The voice returned, and Rey cleared her throat, standing up straight. Looking down briefly, she saw that she was no longer a child - nor was she in her typical clothes. Instead, she wore a long, red gown, something she would never choose on her own. “Sweet one.”_

_“Yeah, well,” Rey eyed the room for any exits, beyond disturbed now. “I have no idea who you are, so--”_

_“Don’t you?” Rey tried to walk but found her feet could not move. She was frozen in place, and the voice grew nearer and nearer. “I know who you are.”_

_She couldn’t even move her hands or her head, and instead, could only sense the source of the voice over her shoulder as it - he? - leaned down to whisper in her ear._

_“I see how lonely you are. I see your dreams, how your soul cries out in the night for someone, anyone. You feel like nothing.” Rey felt a tear slip out of her eye, terror wracking her frame. “You wouldn’t be nothing to me. Rey.”_

At the sound of her name, Rey gasped awake, clutching her chest; the friendly black cat, who had insisted on coming in again last night, was kneading her side anxiously, and meowed when it saw her eyes had opened.

“Good morning,” Rey whispered. The cat tucked into her side, curling into a ball, its purr tangible through the blanket. “Is it morning?” She peered at the alarm clock next to her bed and groaned. 4:02. She prayed she could go back to sleep, and as she worked into a comfortable position, curling herself around the warm lump of cat, she found her exhaustion battling the lingering fear from the dream. _What even was that?_ She hoped that when she fell asleep again, there wouldn’t be a repeat.

She glared at the Anne Rice novel next to her bed. She really, really needed to stop thinking about vampires before sleep.

Or...ever.

***

When Rey unlocked the library doors the next day, her attention was drawn to an envelope, pinned down by a rock, the edges slightly fluttering in the late October breeze. She knelt down and picked it up, examining it with a frown; it had an actual wax seal with an elegant _D._ She carefully slit the thick paper, and removed the letter inside as she pushed the doors open. She paused in her normal morning routine, her feet stumbling to a halt, as she read the contents of the message.

It was written in the beautiful, formal cursive which had captured her imagination not too long ago:

_October 22, 2018_

_Dear Ms. Smith,_

_I hope you can forgive the impropriety of this message and my method of sending it to you. I find myself regretful that I must take leave of Jakku so abruptly. I do not know for how long I will be absent, but I - perhaps foolishly - thought it might be strange if one of your most frequent patrons disappeared without notice. As I do not have the pleasure of possessing a more common way to communicate with you (that is, a phone number or a personal email address - I considered using the one listed on the website, but I figured Mr. Kenobi would be less interested in my departure. Is that forward of me? I humbly apologize), I settled on writing you this letter, which has now quite exceeded its welcome, I am sure._

_I do not wish to leave - and I certainly do not wish to be gone for long. Perhaps it will be but a few days before I return to haunt your library once more, but, given the nature of my journey, I fear it might be longer before I once more find myself in your presence._

_I pray that this letter finds you well; and, that I will find you well upon my return._

_Yours, faithfully,_

_Poe Dameron_

Rey studied the letter once more, flipping it over to see if there were any postscripts, and she also gave the seal another once-over. Then, she laughed, delighted for having received an actual, physical letter. She couldn’t recall the last time she’d gotten a message like this, and she certainly had never received one from a handsome man, one she was very much interested in.

 _Is that forward of me?_ Rey’s lips twitched as she recalled that particular line. She set the envelope and letter down carefully on her desk before flitting about the library as usual, turning on the lights and booting up the computers, and she found herself humming a tune aimlessly as she walked around in a slight haze, some big band number or other that had played on the radio last night as she fixed dinner.

Disappointment mingled with the girlish excitement, however - while it was utterly charming that Poe had taken the time to write her a letter ( _how Mr. Darcy of him_ ), it still meant that she’d go at least a few days without seeing her favorite patron.

Rey shrugged and got to work, burying the lingering tinge of sadness deep where she hid all the other portions of her emotions she’d rather not look at; she’d probably end up dealing with it using pizza or perhaps a binge-watching of her favorite programs that evening. She shelved and catalogued and helped as many people as she could, and when she locked up for the evening, Rey closed the door tightly behind her, tightened Poe’s scarf around her neck (he had given it to her, and as he was still gone...no harm in her using it a little longer), and deeply inhaled the crisp scent of autumn evening mixed with the spicy, rich scent of the scarf.

As she walked down the darkening streets, she could not shake the feeling that someone was watching her. A ridiculous notion, surely. Rey passed several children playing, more than a few couples walking together, and she waved to the tailor who was locking up his shop, but when she turned down her street, the noise seemed to grow muffled.

She fought back a feeling of panic - _don’t be ridiculous,_ she hissed to herself - gritted her teeth and walked down the street, refusing to pick up the pace, although the feeling of eyes on her did not go away or lessen in any respect. It wasn’t the first time she had felt like this walking home, surely a side effect of spending most of her life alone and going home to an empty house, but tonight felt significantly more threatening than normal. Rey liked to think the universe was usually looking out for her - she had survived the trials of her childhood, after all - but the warmth and optimism she usually could identify was entirely absent.

The dark end of the street seemed to grow larger and closer, not in any way in keeping with the size of her steps and speed of her gait, and Rey steadfastly ignored it, the clip of her boot heels against the asphalt the only sound other than the skittering of leaves along the sidewalk. No children were out to play tonight, an oddity for this particular street in the village, and instead, the houses seemed to be shuttered, no welcoming, homey lights shining out to illuminate the darkness.

Just as the paranoia reached a nearly deafening height, Rey reached her gate, opened it quickly, her fingers somewhat stumbling on the latch, and entered her front garden. “Hello,” she said, kneeling to greet the black streak that shot out from her porch. “How are--” The cat flew past her, using its front paws to slam against the gate, shutting it behind Rey. “Well, that was odd.” The cat meowed animatedly at her, bumping its small head against her arm.

Outside the gate, the wind picked up into a howl, and Rey shivered, scooping up her friend and hurrying to her front door. “What was all that about?” Rey asked the cat, who merely sniffed at her scarf and purred more deeply. “Weirdo.”

After she had settled in for the night, Rey was kept up at first by the continuing loud, angry wind - she considered giving up entirely, turning on her bedside light, and just reading, but she had work in the morning, and the more responsible thing to do would be to just try to push through and sleep.

Smushing a pillow over her ear, Rey curled up on her side, squeezed her eye shut, and counted back from two hundred. Eventually, sleep overtook her - but found no more peace in sleeping than she would have staying awake.

_“Hello again.”_

_Rey spun on her heel, scowling into the darkness. “Show yourself.” As an afterthought, she added, “Coward.”_

_“I’m not a coward.” A man emerged from the shadows, tall, cloaked, wearing an odd mask that covered his face. “More of an admirer.”_

_“And you can’t show your face to me?” Rey demanded, glaring up at him. Again, she found herself unable to move. “And you can’t risk me being able to run away?”_

_“Run away?” He reached out and stroked her cheek, and Rey recoiled from it, at least internally. “No, no, you have it all wrong. In a few weeks time, you’ll be running towards me.”_

_“I wouldn’t count on it.” Suddenly, she regained control of her arms and legs, and she stumbled forward, shoving the large man. He laughed, completely delighted, and remained unmoved. No wonder - he was massive, and hitting him felt like ramming into a brick wall. “Who are you?”_

_“Some call me Lord Ren,” he said softly, his voice seeming disrupted by his mask, but still deep and pleasant. “But I would have you know me by my true name.” Once more, he reached out to cup her cheek, and although she could move again, Rey found herself strangely...unwilling to move. “You don’t want to run away.” Maybe she didn’t...but…”Ah, not as strong in here, are you?”_

_“What do you mean?”_

_“Your defenses are lower inside your own mind. I had hoped you would come to me of your own volition, but-” An unbearable heat built up in Rey’s chest. “I will have to accept the alternative-”_

_Lancing pain through her heart, and Lord Ren screamed in protest as she was ripped away from him._

Rey woke to find the cat digging its claws into her chest, right above her heart. “What the fuck?” She shouted, pushing at the cat half-heartedly. The cat’s fur was puffed up, its tail three times its normal size, green eyes wide and massive while a growl built in its throat. “What’s wrong?” Rey had already forgiven the beast, stroking a hand down its spine. “Huh? What’s wrong, sweet boy?”

The cats claws retracted, but its worried sounding growl didn’t relent. It snuggled in tight to her side, mumbling this and that at her, butting her anxiously with its head. Rey was exhausted - _I can’t have slept more than an hour_ \- but a glance at her clock told her it was nearly 3:30. “What on earth?”

Unable to sleep despite her exhaustion, Rey shrugged and got out of bed, pulling a jumper over her head before putting around her kitchen, fixing a pot of tea and grabbing a copy of _Persuasion._ A few chapters into Anne Elliot’s plight, Rey paused and considered something, a memory triggered by the title of the novel.

“Why do you think that man was so pushy?” She asked the cat, which had followed her downstairs, fur now in its proper place as it groomed itself. “And where did he want me to go?” She shook her head and took a sip of her tea before setting it back in its saucer. “And why do I know the name Ren?”

The cat hissed lightly, and Rey looked over at it startled to find its fur sticking up once more. “Silly boy,” she said affectionately, smoothing a hand down its back. “I wonder what your name is.”

The cat seemed to shrug before settling down on its paws and drifitng off - but when Rey peeked up from her book every now and then, she could swear one eye remained open, a green slit staring at her, ever watchful.

***

Work later that day was especially brutal. With no hope of seeing the handsome face that had become her constant beacon of cheer - and when had that happened, when had she let that happen? _Never expect anything, Smith, you just get your heart broken_ \- Rey stumbled through her day, trying to maintain a base level of professional courtesy, but more than once she eyed the comfy chairs in the Easy Reading section and considered just going to kip back there.

Around four in the afternoon, only an hour before closing, she was startled from a half doze (not that entering data was the most exciting thing to do when she was fully charged) by a pleasant London accent.

“Hello.” She looked up and saw a very handsome black man grinning at her.

“Hello.” Rey wiped her eyes and smiled at him. “Sorry, I hope you weren’t waiting long. Can I help you?”

“No.” He looked as though he was enjoying a very amusing private joke. “I’m actually here to help someone else.”

“Uh...are you looking for them?” She grabbed the phone in front of her. “I can do an all-call if you want.”

“No, no, he isn’t here right now.” He extended his hand over the counter. “I’m Finn, by the way. Finn Tico.” Rey took his hand, not entirely convinced she was awake, and smiled at him.

“Rey Smith.” They smiled at each other for another moment, and Rey realized she rather liked his smile. It was very comforting, and it felt as though they’d been old friends her whole life (not that she knew anything about a lifelong anything). “So, this person you’re here to help. Are you doing research for them?”

“In a way.” Finn tilted his head and thought for a moment. “Mostly I’m here to … check things out for them.”

“Do they have a book on hold?” Rey fought a yawn and failed, hiding it in the sleeve of her jumper. “Gosh, sorry. Didn’t sleep well last night.”

“Out late with friends?” Finn’s smile didn’t seem cheeky in the least, more strangely hopeful. “And no, I don’t think he has anything on hold. _Other than his life._ ” He muttered the last part under his breath, and Rey thought that it must not have been meant for her ears at all.

“No, I think...I think it was just the wind.” She yawned again, and when she lowered her hand, she saw Finn giving her a strange look. “Sorry--”

“It wasn’t windy last night.” Finn’s brow furrowed, and he muttered something else under his breath, in a language she didn’t even recognize. It made the hair on the back of her neck prickle, and Rey winced, scratching at her eyebrow as she tried to keep a straight face.

“What was that?”

“What was what?” Finn stopped muttering to himself and then looked sheepish. “Oh, sorry, that was … well I suppose you would call it Yoruba.”

“Ah.” Rey smiled at him and then blinked, shaking herself. “Sorry I’m so useless right now. Is there anything I can help you with?” She had a feeling she’d asked that before, but she couldn’t quite remember.

“No, no, I just wanted to introduce myself.” He lifted his hand and waved at her, and Rey saw the brassy glint of a wedding ring on his fourth finger. “Hello.”

She waved back, grinning at him. “Hello.”

“I’m going to go read something now,” Finn announced, as though the thought had just occurred to him. “I’m a big fan of sci-fi, and mystery. Any recommendations?”

“Mmm.” Rey fumbled around under her desk and pulled out a sci-fi novel she’d just finished yesterday. “If you like Sherlock Holmes, this might do.” She passed him the copy of _The Tea Master and the Detective,_ and Finn took it with a cheerful salute. “Let me know what you think.”

He thanked her and walked to the chair typically occupied by Poe, and waved at her once more once he’d settled down. Rey grinned, happy to have the chair occupied by someone so friendly, and went back to her typing, slightly more awake now, as the conversation had been somehow revitalizing.

When she made the announcement that the library would be closing in five minutes, Finn reappeared at her desk with the book clutched in his hands. “This is _fantastic_!” He declared. “Can I borrow it?”

“Mhm.” Rey smiled at him, reaching for the scanner before she remembered. “That’s actually my copy, so you don’t even have to check it out.”

“Really?” He grinned, delighted, and then paused. “Can I pick your brain over it? Just for a little while? There’s so much going on here, and I love talking things out.”

Rey found herself in a small internal conflict - on one hand, her years of _never trust anyone_ reared their head, but something about Finn Tico's pleasant affability convinced her to nod.

“Sure. I just need to lock up.”

After she was finished closing down for the day, she met Finn outside, and they walked away from the library. While only yesterday, Rey had felt completely disturbed on her walk home, Finn’s presence bolstered her, a warm glow in the growing darkness. They chatted amiably, Finn’s extensive knowledge of Sherlock Holmes and Victorian literature in general truly startling to her.

“I’ve just never met anyone who liked it as much as me,” Rey said, eyes wide. “And you know _so much more_ than I ever could - seriously!” Finn laughed, shrugging her off when she shoved his upper arm. “I need to put you on a trivia team.”

“Oh, please, you should see how much P-my friend knows,” he caught himself from saying something, looking oddly guilt. “About literature. It’s boggling. Then again, he does read way too much.”

“No such thing,” Rey countered cheerily. They approached a corner where the streetlight had died, and she pointed to the right. “This is my turn.”

“Mine too,” Finn pointed in the other direction of her street. “But I’m that way. Staying at the--”

“Inn?” Rey guessed, smiling at him. “Not many places to stay in Jakku.”

“Yeah, it’s definitely not my favorite place.” Finn’s nose wrinkled, and Rey made a noise of protest.

“That’s my village you’re talking about!” Rey said.

“It’s alright,” Finn allowed, his hands raised in defense. “I guess.”

Rey stuck her tongue out at him, but they had almost reached the unlit corner, and she sighed. “I hate seeing dead streetlamps,” she grumbled. “It feels so...creepy.”

“Huh.” Finn eyed it, a few steps away still. “I have a special talent.” He winked at her. “If you promise not to tell.”

“Really?” Rey grinned at him, and studied the streetlamp and then him. “What’s that?”

Finn blinked twice and then pointed at the lamp. At first, nothing happened, but then it flickered back to light, casting a small shadow on Finn’s handsome face, and Rey gasped, delightedly. “You must be some kind of wizard,” she teased.

“Something like that.” Finn smiled at her. “Or I’m just lucky.”

“Whatever it is, I’m a fan,” Rey decided, and they shook hands once more. “Finish that book, and let me know what you think.”

“Goodnight, Ms. Smith.”

The warmth of Finn’s presence did not diminish in his absence, and Rey bounced home very cheerfully indeed, happy to have made a friend. While it was clear he was only in Jakku - and it was very endearing how he couldn’t even spit the name out without making a face - temporarily, it was rare that she got along with someone to the point where she welcomed their presence outside of work hours.

Finn, Ben, and Poe. Three friendly faces that Rey now had encountered in her life, added to the ever blossoming list of things that were very much right in the world. She skipped into her yard, shutting the gate behind her, and she patted the cat on the head before entering her home, a bubble of light, seemingly untouchable, flourishing in her chest.

Of course, she shouldn’t have hoped that this positive feeling would last into the nighttime. Once again, she found herself in the strange underground chamber.

_“You again.” Rey snarled it, already sweeping away from him, searching for an exit or entrance to this bizarre throne room. “What do you want from me?”_

_“Nothing more than absolutely everything.” He sounded slightly amused, but Rey scowled at him ferociously. “Why are you so afraid?”_

_“I’m not afraid of a monster in a mask,” she snapped._

_“Not of me, no,” he allowed. “But of yourself?” Rey didn’t have an answer to that, too busy looking for an escape route. “Of your past?”_

_That caught her attention. “What about my past?”_

_“Oh, sweet one. Do you have any idea what you are?_ ”

**

Poe turned his collar up against the bitter wind sweeping off the moors and followed the old man in front of him. Summoning a witch was hard enough - getting them to talk to you was an entirely different matter.

Lor San Tekka had taken two whole days just to track down, and that was with Ben Kenobi giving him his actual name. Once Poe had confirmed Tekka’s existence at a coven up north, he had set off, not pausing or resting since he’d left Kenobi’s circle of protection.

When he had found the old man’s familiar, it had taken almost ten hours just to convince it that there was an actual concern, and now Poe was finally granted an audience with the former coven leader.

No other witches lived here, that was obvious. As they walked into the space under the hill, Poe admired the shelves of books that lined the entryway and hallways, and he followed Tekka into the labyrinth, well aware that he could be ambushed and killed at any point. But he was here for answers, answers for the Resistance, and answers for himself, and that allowed him to continue on, willing and able to make the ultimate sacrifice. After all, he’d already died once. How bad could the second time be?

“Ben Kenboi reached out to me,” Tekka said over his shoulder, his first words since he’d initially appeared to Poe. “Said you were looking for something.”

“Yes.” Poe stumbled to a halt when Tekka did; they were now in what seemed to be the center of the structure, and it appeared to be some kind of archive. “There’s a girl.”

“A girl?” Tekka seemed amused by this, and Poe scowled at him.

“Not like that.” Tekka didn’t relent in his smirk, and Poe huffed. Witches, honestly. “No. She … she lives in Jakku.” The old man’s face twitched at the name. “So you know it?”

“It is a site of much Dark magic,” Tekka said, rubbing his stubble. “What does this have to do with your visit? And why are you here, specifically?”

“It’s about the _Habentis Maleficia.”_ The moment Poe named the book, Tekka stiffened.

“What would a being like yourself want with the lost annals?” Tekka scowled at him, and Poe winced.

“It’s for...research,” he said lamely. When Tekka’s glare didn’t relent, Poe sighed. “Fine. I work for the Resistance, and we need something in it, a weapon we’ve heard rumor of, to fight and destroy the First Order.”

“Ah.” Tekka inclined his head and began to look through the shelves behind him. He lifted a scrying glass out of his pocket and consulted it, still nodding. “I see. How did it even appear to you?”

“It didn’t,” Poe said in a flat voice. Tekka paused. “It appeared to the girl, under a different name.”

“Oh?” The man turned around, a thoughtful frown on his face. “I only know of one practicing witch in Jakku, and that is my old friend, Kenobi.”

“She isn’t a practicing witch,” Poe said weakly. “She … she’s a librarian. I asked her to find it on a hunch, and, well…”

“Only the most practiced of our kind can even summon that text,” Tekka said sharply. “You’re quite sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure,” Poe snapped. “I’ve been searching for this manuscript for thirty years, and she finds it in an hour.” He shook his head, and Tekka did the same. “It appeared to her, it chose her. And that’s not the worst part.”

“What is the worst part, child?” Tekka examined him carefully, but Poe did his best to keep a straight face, to hide his extreme fear - fear for Rey, and fear of what she had almost done.

“She summoned Death.” Poe pulled his phone out of his pocket and flipped through to the photo he’d snapped of the page Rey had read aloud, the page that had caused her mysterious illness. “And she very nearly succeeded, if your friend hadn’t intervened.”

“Her first spell was to summon Death?” Tekka’s eyebrows would have disappeared into his hair, had he not been bald.

“She didn’t know what the spell did,” Poe explained crossly, feeling mulishly defensive of Rey. “She said she just opened randomly to the page, and Kenobi confirmed that she’d held the book for less than five minutes before she started reading it aloud.”

Tekka’s face darkened. “If this is true, if this girl could do such a thing without any formal training...there is something you should see.” He hobbled to the shelves behind him and, after pulling out a set of keys from his robes, unlocked a glass fronted section not unlike the special collections at Jakku Public Library. He pulled out an ancient text and returned to the table where Poe stood, setting the book down and flipping through with deliberation.

“It is not often our kind works with yours,” Tekka said thoughtfully, his hand smoothing over the tome in front of him. “But, given the circumstances…and Leia Organa’s particular support for peaceful covens…here you are.” He turned the book around, and then he pushed it towards Poe.

He leaned forward to read the passage Tekka pointed out, his eyes widening progressively.

_Bound to shadow, woven by light,_

_She will be gifted with the Sight._

_Hecate’s  curse will mark her from the start,_

_And all shall seek to claim her heart._

_While still searching for her voice,_

_The Chosen will have to make a choice._

 

_A guardian of knowledge and of word,_

_She is master of wisdom and the sword._

_Magic shall not touch her mind,_

_Unless foul Evil wins her to Its kind._

_Any of the Path should fear the same,_

_Beware the girl who knows no name._

 

_The night must have the day to thrive,_

_The dead seek out blood to survive._

_Those who call this plane their home_

_Must pray The Dark One remains alone._

_For if he at last finds his Queen,_

_It will spell Death as the oldest have never seen._

 

“What does this mean for Rey?” Poe asked when he had finished reading. Tekka gripped his arm in what was meant to be a comforting way, surely, but only increased the anxiety clawing at Poe’s throat.

“It means Kylo Ren cannot find the girl. This weapon your Resistance seeks - it is not an object at all. It is a person, and she has the power to destroy everything.”

“Rey wouldn’t--” Poe paused, a new fear rising in his chest. “Kylo Ren’s already found her.”

“How?” Tekka demanded, his hand much tighter on Poe’s arm now. “How did that happen?”

“A few months ago.” Poe licked his bottom lip, a desperate fear surging through him. “Fuck--he found her by _accident._ Tried to glamour her, and it didn’t work. He’s been sending First Order thugs after her ever since.”

“Then it might be too late.” Tekka settled heavily in a chair and buried his face in his hands. “We might have already lost her to him.”

“It’s not too late.” Poe’s hands curled into fists. “It’ll never be too late. I won’t lose her.” Tekka lifted his face to examine Poe’s, and he sighed heavily.

“Take the prophecy with you.” He gestured at the book, and Poe hastened to comply, ripping the page out and apologizing the gods of the library for the action. “And for all of our sakes, I hope you’re right.”

Poe bowed. “Thank you.” He turned to sprint out the doors - with no intention of stopping until he reached Jakku, secrecy be damned - but Tekka stopped him.

“I can summon a portal for you.” He sounded amused again. “Honestly, you nightwalkers are so dramatic.”

**

The day after she met Finn, Rey was disappointed to see that he was not present at the library in the morning. After lunch, business slowed slightly, and while there were a few people sitting in the common area, it seemed much less busy than usual.

Around three in the afternoon, a man approached her while she was examining the reference section for an encyclopedia that had gone missing. Rey barely spared him a glance when he greeted her, and smiled vaguely at the space around the section.

“Can I help you?”

“Yes, I think so.” His voice was smooth but somehow oily, and Rey felt like she had been doused with cold water. She turned to look at him - and immediately regretted it.

He should be handsome, he really should. He had flaming red hair and piercing blue eyes, an aristocratic facial structure, and a lean, tall build. But there were massive circles under his eyes, which bore a cruel light, and his lips were drawn back in a sneer, exposing almost viciously sharp teeth.

Rey backed away slightly, praying her face didn’t betray her alarm. “Is there a book you needed?”

“No.” He sneered further, following her as she walked backwards. “Rey Smith.”

“How do you know my name?” Rey demanded.

“Lord Ren grows tired of waiting.” He grabbed her arm, and Rey shrieked.

“You let her go!” Mr. Davies appeared out of nowhere, and smacked the stranger with his briefcase.

“You pathetic meat sack,” the man snarled. He grabbed Ted with his free hand, and Rey shouted in protest. She kicked the man savagely, willing all of her strength into it, and he howled in pain, releasing the elderly Mr. Davies.

“Run!” She screamed at him, and he did, stumbling away and pulling his phone out, no doubt to call the police. The stranger laughed, and dragging Rey with him, grabbed the phone out of Ted’s hand and smashed it.

“Enough of this.” He picked Rey up using nothing but her arm and hurled her backwards. Rey slammed into a table, feeling it splinter and crack underneath her, and she gasped as the wind was thoroughly knocked out of her. Rey rolled to her side, coughing weakly, trying to heave a breath, but it was no use.

The red-haired man stalked towards her, smirking delightedly, ignoring the panicked screams of the patrons who rushed to hide from him. “Let’s go, you mewling, pathetic--”

Rey reached behind her, searching for something, anything, and found a piece of wood from where the table had shattered and splintered. She was dragged to her feet a second later, coughing still, as the man grabbed her by the collar and hauled her upright. “Lord Ren is not a patient man,” he roared. “And neither am I. What do you have to say for yourself?”

“Fuck you,” Rey gasped, and used what was left of her energy to stab him with the wood in her hand. She expected to startle him enough to let her go, but instead, he screamed shrilly, releasing her. The wood remained in his chest, sticking out at a shocking angle over his heart, and he stumbled backward, still screaming.

No blood came from the wound. Rey clutched at her aching side, her eyes burning as she still fought for breath, and then -

He disintegrated.

“What the fuck?” Rey asked weakly, staggering forward. There was a pile of ash on her carpet. _Someone’s going to have to sweep that up,_ she thought hysterically. _I guess that’s me._

“Rey!” A shout of her name caught her attention, and she squeaked when Poe Dameron flew through the doors, his hair tousled, eyes wild, an inhuman snarl on his face.

“P-poe?” She gasped. The patrons were still screaming and sobbing around her, and Rey was just trying to make sense of _any_ of this.

“Oh, Merlin help us,” Poe snarled, dragging a hand over his face. “You all. Here. Now.” He barked at the gathered, crying people, and miraculously they all stopped crying and stumbled forward to form a strange kind of audience. “Is this all of them?” He asked Rey, who nodded once, breathless still.

When he next spoke, his voice lapsed into a smooth, pleasant tone, layered with something - but Rey couldn’t focus on it, no, not right now -

“Nothing happened. There was a water pipe that burst, and you evacuated the library. You had a pleasant day before then, and any injury or frustration that came from this was entirely not the fault of this institution. You remember nothing of what transpired since -” He checked the clock. “2:30 p.m. today. Now, please go.” They all stumbled from the scene and out the doors - Rey blinked, but how long had she blinked for, because Poe was at the doors, locking them firmly and turning back to her, a look of terror on his face.

“Are you alright?” He asked hoarsely, walking forward much more slowly.

He reached her, and Rey twitched, and then held the piece of wood aloft between them. Poe eyed it warily and raised his hands. “Rey?”

“What - the _fuck_ \- was that?”

“Any chance I could get you to let this go?” Poe asked earnestly.

Rey stared at him in shock. “Any chance--” she spluttered. “No, there is no chance in _hell_ I’m going to let this go! What _was_ that?”

“We can talk about it over dinner?”

 _Did he just_ -

“I have just m-murdered a man in my library! My library is _destroyed_! And you’re asking to go to _dinner_? What do you _think_?”

“I was thinking Mexican?” Poe joked, his smile fading at the fury on her face, or maybe something else.

At this point, the pain in her side became too much, and Rey clutched at it weakly. “God, what is _happening_?”  

“I can explain everything.” Poe’s voice sounded like it was coming from very far away, almost unintelligible over the roaring in her ears.. “If you’ll just let me -- Rey?” 

“I think my ribs are broken.” _Also, when did it get dark in here_?

“Rey!” Poe’s shout was the last thing she was aware of before the darkness swallowed her whole - that, and his arms reaching out to catch her.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :3
> 
>  
> 
> Okay so maybe it needs to be six chapters?
> 
>  
> 
> This week was the Worst Week Ever and I know I owe everyone updates of a million things and a bunch of responses to comments but gaaahh sorry for being so out of the loop.


	4. I Want You For Mine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Rey wakes up after the attack in the library, she has many questions for Poe Dameron.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is entirely in Poe's POV! Warnings for references to past violence/blood/deaths (Poe's turning was not a pleasant business)

Poe sat in utter misery, waiting for Rey to open her eyes.

He had caught her when she fell, had screamed her name upon seeing her grey, pale face, cruelly mimicking the mask of death. Her weight was negligible in his arms as he raced through the small town of Jakku, not caring if some keen-eyed mortal caught a glimpse of him as he moved.

Still slightly weary from the effort of glamouring that many humans at once - for their own protection, he reminds himself, for their protection and hers - something akin to adrenaline had spurred Poe into his sprint across town, the woman he loved cradled in his arms. In the face of her near destruction, he found that he could no longer deny himself the simple acknowledgment that his world, for so long built upon the resistance to evil, to the protection of mankind, now centered on this woman.

In an attempt to hide her from the First Order (who would, no doubt, soon be aware that Ren’s top lieutenant was now dead, accidentally killed by a young mortal woman with no awareness of their kind), Poe brought her into his own home, laying her down on the sofa, and letting Bebe fuss over her while Poe raced to find his medical supplies.

Luckily, Finn had trained as an apothecary a few hundred years ago, so Poe had a number of magical herbs and salves that he could put into bandages - he soaked them in hot water, and then gingerly lifted the bottom of Rey’s shirt to survey the damage. Poe hissed angrily between his teeth when he saw the mottled bruising, the flaming red evidence of what that monster had wrought, and tenderly he wrapped her ribs, listening carefully to the quiet sounds of Rey’s body, trying to discern any additional damage.

He ended up wrapping her wrist as well as rubbing an ointment to a sore spot on her scalp, and then he skittered across the room, nearly overwhelmed by the song of her blood. Poe gripped his desk and breathed shallowly, trying to calm himself the way he would were he still human, and then stormed into the kitchen to grab a box of salt. Setting it carefully next to Rey, Poe settled across the room on a chair and waited.

For an hour, he waited for the herbs to take effect, for the magic Finn had breathed into them to set in; for an hour, he struggled with the knowledge that he had been too late to help her. His lips could not stop from twitching at the memory of his avenging angel, standing over the charred remains of one Armitage Hux. While he had been too late to help her, his sweet Rey was a formidable warrior and had taken matters into her own hands, despite knowing _nothing_ about his world.

Rey stirred some three hours after he had taken her from the library, and Poe sat stiffly, waiting anxiously for her eyes to open. And at long last they did, lashes fluttering as she gained awareness. After looking around for a moment or two, she sat upright and gasped, and Poe could hear her heartbeat accelerate with painful rapidity. “It is alright,” he spoke softly, and Rey flinched backwards into the sofa, her hand scrabbling blindly, no doubt for a weapon. “I mean you no harm.”

“What the fuck?” He could see her form trembling from where he sat. “What the _fuck_?”

“I am so sorry,” Poe allowed his honesty to imbue his words. He was sorry. “I did not mean for you to find out -” _this way,_ he should say, but honestly, he would have vastly preferred that she never find out what he was.

“Where am I?” Rey grabbed at her ribs and gasped, wincing slightly. “What - what was that thing? What are _you_?” The accusation in her question made Poe wince as well, and sorrow gripped him. She would have nothing to do with him after this; he could not compel her to forget, and honestly, his essence shied away from the idea of manipulating her like that.

“You are in my home,” Poe said, gesturing around the living room. Rey followed his movement, her eyes flickering around, landing on the painting behind him, the one commissioned of him in the -

“That painting is at least two hundred years old,” Rey said, squinting at it. “Easily. But….” she trailed off and stared at Poe, and then back at the painting.

“It is of me, yes.” Poe shifted in his seat and glanced down at his hands, wishing for the strength to continue. “Which, I suppose, answers your next questions. The...thing that attacked you was, as I am sure you realized, a vampire.” He lifted his eyes to her face and forced himself to confess. “As am I.”

Rey nodded faintly, her eyes darting around the room again. Bebe barked anxiously in front of her, and Rey looked at him. Oddly enough, her lips twitched. “And he’s a ghost? A ghost dog? Dog ghost?”

“He is a spirit, yes.” Poe smiled down at the ephemeral creature. “Say hello, Bebe.” Another cheerful bark, and Rey leaned down and patted him on the head. Remarkably, she made contact with him, and Poe stared in amazement. “You are full of surprises, Ms. Smith.”

She leaned down slowly and picked up the box of kosher salt from where Poe had left it. Rey studied it with a curious expression on her face. Poe decided to explain before she had to ask, as a sign of good faith. “In case you wish to protect yourself from me.” He tugged on his curls nervously. “You are perfectly welcome to pour it in a circle around me, where I sit. I will not fight you, and I will not be able to leave it.”

“Really?” Rey weighed the box in her hand and raised her eyes to him skeptically. “Why would you tell me that?”

“Because I want you to feel safe.” Poe rested his elbows on his knees. “Regretfully, I understand that in bringing you here, most certainly against your will, I have ruined whatever trust you might have had in me.” He could both hear and see her jaw clench. “But you must understand - I needed to ensure your safety, and I could not bring you to your home.”

“Oh my God.” Rey’s hand covered her mouth, and Poe tried not to flinch at the Lord’s name. “You know where I live.”

The memory of walking her home teased him, the fond, golden memory of walking her to her gate and bidding her a good night, of doing something normal and respectable with a woman he cared about. _She must hate me -_

“Does that mean … _they_ ” - she jerked her head to the side nervously, as though trying to say the word _vampire_ and failing - “All know where I am, too?”

“You mistake me.” Poe cleared his throat and clenched his fist on his knee. “The one who attacked you tonight is no associate of mine. He is - was - part of an ancient order of cruel beings who seek to cause chaos and hunt mankind. I would never share information with them.”

Rey tilted her head but rather than ask for clarification on that point, she surprised him with a different question. “You say you couldn’t bring me to my home. Why is that?”

Poe blinked and answered honestly once more. “Because you have never invited me in.” On the couch, Rey sat upright slowly, carefully, and as she crossed one leg over another, Poe mirrored her body language. Humans seemed to find that comforting. “My kind cannot enter a dwelling without direct permission from the owner. I suppose that is why the familiar who lives with you is so adamant that you enter your home as soon as you arrive.”

“He’s a -” Rey frowned.

“A witch’s familiar.” Poe leaned forward slowly, praying that she didn’t find it threatening, to smile at her. “There is a witch who is clearly very fond of you. They seem to have lent their familiar to you for the last few months. And it is very trying, for a witch to be that far from their familiar for very long.”

“So … the cat is...a witch...familiar,” Rey repeated slowly, brow furrowing. “And he wants to keep you...all...out. And you had to kidnap” - Poe flinched at her phrasing, but did not doubt its accuracy - “me because you’ve never been invited in?”

“That is correct, yes.”

“I guess I already knew that part.” Rey propped her chin on her palm and frowned into the distance. “Kylo kept insisting that I join him, that I had to come to him.”

“What?” Poe asked sharply, and Rey seemed to remember that he was there. “Kylo did _what_?”

“I’ve been having dreams.” Rey shifted in her seat, and Poe noticed that she had not moved to grab the salt yet, either because she did not believe in its potency, or she did not fear him. He did not know which was less appealing. “Horrible dreams. I’m trapped underground with him, and he wants _something_ from me. And he talks about destiny and fate and power, and it’s all very...awful. He seems to think that I can’t fight him off as well when I’m sleeping.”

“That’s probably true.” Poe wiped a hand down his face tiredly and regretted the look of anxiety on Rey’s face. “I suppose you have many questions.”

“Thousands.”

“You can ask anything you want, and I would tell you the truth.” Poe hoped that it would be enough for her to believe him, and thankfully, Rey took a deep breath and began to ask.

“How old are you?” Rey snorted and shook her head. “God, that’s pretty _Twilight,_ huh?”

“A little.” Poe smirked at her, unable to help himself. “I’m seventeen,” he intoned dramatically.

Rey kept a straight face as she simpered, “And how long have you _been_ seventeen?”

They both laughed, and Poe’s heart lightened considerably. This was a far cry better than her screaming and throwing things at his head, which was certainly what he was expecting after watching the aftermath of her staking the undead lieutenant of the king of the underworld.

“In all seriousness,” Poe was still smiling, “I did quite like _Twilight._ ”

“No.” When he merely nodded to confirm what he’d said, Rey sighed and reached for the salt. “I guess I really do need this.” Her lips kept twitching upward into a smile, so he hoped that meant she was kidding (But truly he was relieved to see that she had at least enough of an instinct to keep her hand on the box).

“To answer your question truthfully, I was born sometime before the year 1500.”

“Seriously?” Her hazel eyes widen, and Poe tries desperately not lose himself in them, not more than he already has.

“Seriously.” Rey was leaning forward now as well, and Bebe sat at her feet like a small knight. “I was older than thirty years when...when they came.”

“They?” Rey shook her head. “Sorry, I’m being a little monosyllabic. It’s just not every day you hear that your favorite library patron is not only a vampire, but also over five hundred years old.”

“It is close to 525 years, yes.” Poe gazed at the small tapestry hung behind Rey, and he focused on it, trying not to focus on the five hundred years that separated them in age, five hundred reminders that he was a terrible fit for her life and her future. “And as for _they_ …

“I grew up in what you would call Guatemala. My mother was indigenous to the land there, and my father was a Spaniard who defected from his people after he fell in love with her. They lived a very happy life with my mother’s people, until 1524.” Poe cleared his throat and looked down at his lap, the pain still fresh after so long. “When the conquistadores came.” The echo of the past roared over him -

 _Chaos, bloodshed, screaming from the village - Poe screaming for his mother, finding her dead, screaming for his father, finding him - the cruel sharp smile of a devil with white skin, eyes blood red, teeth dripping as it looked up from its feast_ -

“My parents and my people were slaughtered or enslaved.” Poe rubbed the side of his leg for something to do, determinedly not looking at Rey for her reaction. “And the one who turned me...he was a conqueror, too, just a different sort. So the Old World reshaped the New, and everything that came before was changed, lost, or forgotten.

“Everything but me.”

Rey’s voice was quiet but without pity. “I’m so sorry, Poe.” He looked at her in surprise, and found tears in her eyes. “That’s horrible.” He nodded, unable to speak, and thankfully, she asked another question. “What happened after that? And how do you know...Kylo?”

“I traveled for some time. Around the world, more than once, some places calling to me more than others. I was without a cause for a long time - the one who changed me sought to make me like him, to make me a conqueror, an empire-builder, but I resisted. My love for my parents and for humanity survived my transformation, and while drinking blood is a requirement for my survival, I do not relish it.” Poe rubbed his jaw, always just a little sore from his constant thirst. With Rey so near, it was harder than normal to ignore.

“Eventually, I was found by a woman who was slightly older than myself, who had been changed in France in the fifteenth century. Her name is Leia, and she had started a rebellion against the old ways.” Poe smiled at the thought of his brave and fearless leader. “Leia took me in, showed me the way that we could live - protectors of humanity, patrons of the arts, lover of the words of man and vampire alike. My death became something closer to life, and I found friends along the way. And as for Kylo…

“He is a newer vampire, a dangerous one, half-witch, and half-vampire. He leads a group called the First Order, built in the ashes of the imperialistic parasites who sought to control the world centuries ago. And now I work with Leia to combat their evil. Some of my friends are fighters, but I do reconnaissance, studying ancient texts and finding connections for her to aid in our fight against the First Order.”

“You’re a research vampire.” Rey beamed at him, and Poe snorted at the moniker. “You do research.”

“Something like that,” Poe agreed because Rey was agreeable,a and he found that he was rather enchanted by her smile. “Do you have any other questions?”

“You say you’ve traveled all over the world.” Rey looked around, no doubt taking in his various tokens and souvenirs from his travels; she grabbed his small throw pillow and started to toy with the fringe. “Where’s this from?”

“Pier One.” Poe managed to keep a straight face, right up until Rey chucked the pillow at his head. “Hey! That is my favorite pillow from Pier One. It’s from the nineties!”

“It’s as old as I am!” Rey crowed in delight, and Poe winced. She must have noticed, for she quieted and they both took some time in reflection. In that time, Poe marveled at how well she was taking this - he wasn’t entirely sure she wasn’t in shock, and she would require intense observation, no doubt.

When he looked at her again, she was staring evenly at him. “So that book….it wasn’t actually a work in progress?’

“No. It’s my…” Poe floundered in search for the right word.

“Diary?” Rey’s lips twitched, and he was overwhelmed yet again with the desire to trace those lips with his fingers, or even his own lips.

“Yes ma’am.”

“I have another question,” Rey perked up, and Poe mirrored her posture. He gestured for her to go on. “Will you sit over here?”

Poe started in surprise. “You wish for me to be near you?”

“It’s just sort of awkward to be sitting like” - Rey flapped her hand between them - “This. LIke we’re at an interview. Could you just-”

“Yes, of course.” Poe hastily complied and crossed the room perhaps a bit quicker than he would if Rey were still unaware of his true nature. Judging by her expression, she had caught his speed. The intoxicating smell of her, of old books and jasmine and something unnameable, drowned his senses in their renewed proximity, and Poe was well aware that the haunting scent of Rey would linger in his home for hours after her departure, and the thought made him feel oddly lonely. “Is that your only question?’

“No.” Rey shook her head and turned to face him on the couch, her legs curling up underneath her. She looked distinctly comfortable and at home, and Poe’s heart twinged with forbidden domesticity. “...Why are you in Jakku? I mean, it’s a tiny little village, nothing really seems to happen here.”

“You were attacked by a vampire not even four hours ago.” Poe felt his eyebrows creep near his hairline, and Rey scoffed at him.

“Yeah, yeah, but like, before then. It’s just...Jakku.”

“Just Jakku,” Poe muttered, shaking his head. He steeled himself for the next part of this conversation, where would have to tell Rey the truth of what she was. “I have been in Jakku for nearly seven months because it seems to be a focal point for a lot of First Order activity.  In addition to the presence of vampires, many covens used to exist in this area, and in fact, a thousand years ago, this entire area was run by witches.”

“Witches.” Rey shook her head and rubbed her temples, no doubt experiencing a headache in the fallout of her adrenaline and this massive surge of information. “You did mention witches...Sorry, God, this is just going to take some getting used to.”

“Yes, witches.” Poe cleared his throat. “Witches and vampires are rarely...friends. But the First Order seems particularly interested in a kind of magic that vampires usually do not seek. Namely, they seek a weapon, that I was tasked with finding, a weapon mentioned in a prophecy.”

“A weapon?” Rey’s nose wrinkled adorably, and Poe curled his hands into fists to stop himself from reaching out and smoothing the lines away.

“Yes.” She would know, now, the thing that could be all of their undoing. “A weapon foretold in a prophecy of … unpleasant magnitude.” He phrased it delicately, and crossed his legs to match Rey’s stance. “The weapon that Leia has been trying to find for years, and that Kylo has been seeking to use for years. It is not a constructed thing at all, nor a spell, as it would appear. It is a person. Namely, a witch.”

Rey waited for him to continue, her fingers twitching impatiently, and Poe frowned and tried to discern the best way of relaying this revelation. “The prophecy speaks of a person resistant to the charms of my kind, resistant to most magic. A woman, without a real name, without a family, who has unknown power, and an affinity for both spellcasting and fighting. Closer to a sorcerer than a witch, really.”

He locked eyes with Rey, and he saw a flicker of something vast and terrible in the hazel, a spark that could ignite untold changes in the world - or even, destruction.

“It’s you, Rey.” The words built heavily between them, and Poe regretted their construction. “You’re the witch from the prophecy, what the Resistance has been trying to find...and Kylo.”

“And what happens,” Rey whispered. “What happens if Kylo finds me?”

“The prophecy mentions something...about the world ending,” Poe cannot hid the truth from her, not now. “Something about death and destruction the likes of which the world has never seen.”

“Yikes.” Rey laughed bitterly and rubbed her eyes as though incredibly tired (and she might well be). “And...you found all this out during your research, during your time in Jakku?”

“Not...exactly…” But Rey was not done with her train of thought, and she plowed forward, tears in her eyes.

“And here I was, thinking you’d taken an interest in me because you were flirting with me,” Rey said with a faux blitheness which barely masked a tone of bitterness. “Not because you were actively trying to stop the Apocalypse. God, you must think I’m a fool.”

“Don’t say that.” Poe groaned and buried his face in his hands. “Do not say that, I beg you.”

“And why not?” Rey demanded. “Why can’t I say that? I should just accept that the only person who’s actively taken an interest in me other than my boss has only done so because I’m part of some ancient, creepy as shit prophecy?”

Poe felt his grief slacken somewhat in his sudden embarrassment, and he muttered, “I only just learned the prophecy a day ago.”

“Oh?” Rey tilted her head at him. “So why were you in the library so much before then?”

“Because,” he sighed. “Because, I needed to complete research for the Resistance, it _is_ part of my job, and Jakku has always been high in our interest. But…even aside from that…there was another reason for me to be there.” Rey didn’t relent in staring at him, and he groaned. “It was seeing you. You were the main reason for my being in Jakku for so long.”

“Oh.” She seemed to consider this, a lovely blush crossing the apples of her cheeks. “ _Oh._ ”

“Yes, oh,” Poe said, a small flame of amusement flickering to life even in the core of the confusion and grief in his mind. “You entranced me. I needed to see you, to see if you were safe.”

She drew closer, no doubt a byproduct of his damnable nature – but no, no she was immune to that, was she not? Rey was only a foot away from him now, and Poe could barely remember the oath of the Resistance, his own name, let alone the reasons for why he could not have this woman. “Well then,” she whispered, studying his lips with open curiosity. “I’m safe. Mission accomplished.”

Rey clearly meant to be cheeky, to make him laugh, but it was the reminder he needed. “It is not anywhere near accomplished,” he told her gently, holding his hand out to grasp her shoulder. The heat of her bled through the fabric of her shirt, threatening to burn him, to eclipse his senses with its brightness. “You are still very much in danger, sweet Rey. We must find a way to keep you safe.”

“I feel safe right now,” Rey insisted, still leaning into him. Poe sighed, a moth to flame, and leaned in as well. He could almost feel the way their breath mingled, hers painted with the colors of life, his merely an exhalation of already extant particles, his lungs and heart having not worked in half a millennium. “For someone who kidnapped me, you certainly make me feel safe.”

“I shouldn’t,” Poe said, regretting his inability to just sink into the moment, to sink into _her_ – “I am, at my most base level, a monster.”

Rey pulled back then, and he was relieved for having convinced her, and torn apart for the exact same reason. “Don’t say that,” she said sternly. “I’ve seen monsters. I’ve known them. You aren’t one.” He opened his mouth to protest, but she lay a burning warm, tantalizing finger across his lips, and his universe staggered to a halt, drawn to the singular points of her skin touching his, and her words. “I have known cruel, vicious men who only wanted to hurt people. I lived with them, and was hurt by them—” It wasn’t the point of this speech, but Poe’s instincts roared with protest, seeking vengeance in her name. “—I’ve known terrible men, and I’ve known good men, as well. And I think I know the difference. Don’t discount my ability to make a decision for myself from some misinformed nobility.”

He struggled to argue with what she had said, and found himself floundering. Eventually, he shook his head in wonderment. “You see right through me,” he said thoughtfully.

Rey grinned at him, a strangely cheeky expression for so serious a conversation. “I did read your diary,” she pointed out.

Poe laughed, low in his throat, the moment growing charged once more. He took her hand slowly and brought it to his mouth, and he felt Rey’s breath catch as he dragged his lips across the thin skin inside her wrist, inhaling the deep scent of her, his eyes shutting of their own accord, an involuntary groan building in his throat from the urge to take her, both as a man and as a vampire. “That you did,” he murmured instead, his eyes opening but only halfway.

“Poe.” His name has never sounded so sweet, so wonderful, but she must know.

“I have grown to care about you,” Poe said firmly without a trace of embarrassment. Her cheeks flushed even deeper, and her scent grew sweeter, more intoxicating, and Poe trembled at the undeniable note of desire in its song. “So much, my sweet beam of sun. I do not know if you could ever care about me the way I do y-”

“I do.” Rey cut him off, and she flipped her hand to squeeze his, a flare of warmth shooting to his lower gut. “I care about you. I more than - God, Poe, I don’t think I’ve ever felt like this.”

“May He forgive me,” Poe whispered, turning his face away from her and breathing through his mouth shallowly. The urge to _take_ was even stronger than before, but he could not give in. “What you tell me brings me such joy, but also terrible sorrow.” Their legs are touching now, their noses still but a foot apart. “For I rejoice to hear that you might return my feelings, but I despair because it cannot be.”

“And why not?” Rey looked disbelieving. “Some stupid law about vampires and humans?”

“No.” Poe frowned mulishly, and if his mother were still alive, she’d scold him for pouting. As it were, Leia would probably do the same. “But vampires and _witches_ -”

“Not a witch,” Rey interrupted.

Poe gave her a stern look, and she half-smiled. “Vampires and witches have a bad history of...romance.”

“What if I don’t care?” Poe smiled at her adamance, but Rey shook her head. “Seriously! Why the fuck would I care? I’m not really a witch, no matter what your stupid prophecy says; at least I haven’t known about it for my entire life up to this point, so why should I let this random thing decide what I can and can’t do now?”

“Because,” Poe’s voice rises from his barely restrained passion, from the instinct - a man’s instinct, not a monster’s - to hold her to him and demonstrate his love most ardently, “Because if I harmed you, I could never live with myself.” Rey’s eyes flashed, but Poe continued, clasping her hands tightly in his. “Do you think it was pleasant to find you, cold and collapsed this afternoon? Do you think I rejoiced at the thought of you at the mercy of one of my kind? A wicked one, to be sure, but still - until you know more about your power, I would be distinctly at an advantage over you physically, and if I did anything to hurt you, I - I-” Poe struggled to continue but cut himself off, trembling at the very thought of it.

“So, what are you saying?” Rey’s jaw was set stubbornly, her eyes still flashing dangerously, and Poe reached out slowly to tuck a piece of her hair behind her ear. “We have to just put our feelings aside and try to be friends?”

“Yes.” Poe hated himself for it, but, “Yes, that is precisely what I am saying. I know I cannot stay away from you - unless you told me to - and I know I cannot trust myself with anything more, not unless we risk you…” He licked his bottom lip, almost losing his resolve when he saw how hungrily Rey’s eyes tracked the movement. “Turning. Or worse.”

“Alright.” Rey had yet to drop his other hand, and Poe took comfort in that fact. “So, we stay friends?”

“You could help me do my research,” Poe said softly, playing with the smooth skin of her palms. “Now that you have more information.”

“I do like information,” Rey admitted, and then she glared at him out of the corner of her eye. “Cheater. Playing dirty, dangling millenia of hidden information in front of a librarian.”

“Mhm.” Poe smiled fully at her, so terribly glad that she had not demanded he vacate her life, this instant. “And you are always welcome to peruse my personal library.” He jerked his chin upwards, to the upper floor of the house, where his books were. “It’s a very extensive collection, with many rare editions, some only published once, with a dozen copies or less.”

“You’re making it very difficult to not want to be friends with you,” Rey teased, smiling at him with an affection that made his heart ache.

“That was my plan, yes.” They smiled at each other, and Rey squeezed his hands before letting go.

“So, dinner?” Rey looked around and grabbed her satchel at the foot of the sofa. As though on cue, her stomach rumbled. “As friends, of course.”

“Of course.” When they stood, Poe offered her his arm - it was only polite, after all- and they walked for the door.

As the night air hit their faces, bringing with it the crisp chill of late October, Poe could almost pretend that what he had suggested was feasible, but as Rey tucked herself into his arm, her hair falling into her face while they walked across the boundary of his home, he felt his love for her grow steadily, steadily, as it had for so long, and as it would for the indefinite, infinite future.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (there's definitely going to be a fifth chapter to wrap this part of their story up....but then again, maybe there needs to be more...with the First Order....not to mention.....the Very Smutty Later Chapters...if people were still interested)


	5. Sweet Delight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Poe and Rey continue their research together, attempting to maintain a friendship despite their blossoming attraction to each other. Rey learns some details of her past; and, a dangerous encounter at a club for fae leaves the pair with emotions running high.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'M SO SORRY IT'S BEEN A MONTH I HOPE YOU ARE STILL LIKING THIS FIC AND NOT HATING ME
> 
>  
> 
> here's a 9k word chapter to apologize.

As the days blurred past around them and faded into November, Poe and Rey found increasing excuses to conduct their research together.

Rey often caught Poe staring at her wistfully when he thought she wasn’t looking - and to be quite fair, she was only looking over at him in order to stare wistfully at him. However, she found that it was hard to catch a vampire off-guard, and she often considered offering a solution to him, wherein they would both just stare wistfully at each other and not even bother trying to hide it.

She was glad, really, that he wanted to be friends and not just run away from her entirely. Rey had a lifetime of people running away from her, and now that she was used to seeing her patron on a relatively daily basis, she couldn’t imagine spending a day without seeing him at least once. It almost frightened her, how reliant she had become on their interactions, how reliant she was on counting on Poe to walk into her library, a notebook tucked under his arm, his satchel hanging from his shoulder. Rey could count on Poe to show up, rain or shine, his curls slightly rumpled, a shy smile on his handsome face, and she could count on him to listen to her about her day, offer her advice, and then ask for her own advice in return.

Her heart ached daily, though, from the knowledge that Poe was forever to be off-limits to her in any respect different from platonic friendship. His warning that he feared an imbalance of power made an irritating amount of sense, and Rey wanted to walk back to the point _before_ she knew what he was (although he’d confessed to her since that he wouldn’t have been able to keep it a secret from her for much longer, especially in light of the prophecy), before she knew of the five hundred years separating them, of Poe’s inhuman strength and speed, his centuries of experience that made him believe that he would be an unworthy suitor (his words, not hers).

Rey thought Poe would be a very worthy suitor, indeed - her frequent dreams of him (her more pleasant dreams, as she was still plagued by horrifying nightmares and visions) liked to remind her of the fact that she tried so hard to ignore while awake. Poe Dameron was beautiful, and kind, and funny, and self-sacrificing to a fault, and Rey wanted him desperately. She’d be able to ignore it better, if she didn’t also love him desperately.

Around mid-November, after an intense session of research in the library after her shift - Ben Kenobi watching them warily the whole time from his desk, something that gave Rey pause - Poe insisted on taking her home, eyeing the dark, stormy sky above them.

“Alright, you can walk me home.” Rey smiled at Poe with what she prayed wasn’t too obvious of affection, her heart already breaking for the time that would certainly come in the future, when Poe met a nice vampire and settled down with someone who he deemed a better match than her (and her logic told her quite firmly that this was not Poe’s reason for rejecting her romantically, but her heart and experience and soul and wounded pride suggested otherwise).

“I don’t intend to walk you home.” Poe ushered her out the front door, nodding respectfully at Ben. Rey waved at the older librarian before walking through the door Poe held open for her. “I intend to drive you home.”

He gestured at a car parked some three hundred feet away from the entrance of the library; it was a nice car, and one Rey hadn’t seen before. She raised her eyebrows in surprise, but her breath caught almost immediately afterwards in her throat when Poe placed a hand on the small of her back to guide her forward.

“Sorry,” he murmured, casting quick, nervous glances over his shoulder at frequent intervals. “I did not mean to startle you.”

“You didn’t.” Rey prayed he couldn’t sense her blush in the darkness, but given what she knew about vampires and their sensitivity to blood, she was sure he could feel the heat coursing through her face, the heat that resulted from having him touch her so intimately. _Get it together, Smith._ Casting about desperately for something to say that wasn’t a proposition, Rey studied his car as they neared it. “I didn’t know you even owned one of these.”

“I didn’t.” Poe unlocked the car swiftly and opened the door for her. Rey got in, his statement catching up to her as he closed her door and raced to the other side with a speed that her eyes couldn’t quite track. He hopped into the driver’s seat and pulled away from the curb, barely checking the rear view mirror.

They sped through the quiet town, and Rey examined Poe’s face. “You...did you buy a car just to drive me home?”

She watched his hands tighten on the steering wheel in response. “...Maybe.”

Rey couldn’t quite help the snort that escaped her.

“What?”

“Oh, nothing, nothing.” Rey stared out the window at the homes flashing by, and then she giggled again.

“Could you please inform me of the joke?” She could hear the smile in Poe’s voice, and she grinned as well, shaking her head but not looking over at him.

“I think the nicest thing a guy ever bought for me before this was, like, pizza.”

“Surely, you must be joking.” Poe made a noise of indignation when she didn’t contradict her statement. “Pizza? The nicest thing your paramours bought for you in the past was _pizza_?”

“A whole pizza,” Rey muttered, still smiling. “In their defense.”

Poe muttered something under his breath in Spanish, and Rey sneaked a glance at him; she saw that he was scowling out the front windshield.

“What’s wrong?” She teased him lightly, reaching over the console to poke his arm. She let her finger stay longer than was strictly necessary, and Rey was amused to see Poe tense and then relax under the contact.

“Nothing.” His scowl didn’t lighten, but when Rey leaned forward and whispered _please?_ he relented almost immediately. “It’s just...you deserve to be wooed.”

“Wooed?” Rey sat up straight again and cocked her head at him.

“Yes, wooed.” If vampires could blush, Rey was fairly certain Poe’s face would be on fire. “Courted. Properly romanced.” He lifted one hand off the wheel - where he’d been holding his hands at a most proper position - to gesture vaguely. “You deserve to be...swept off your feet. It irritates me that your paramours in the past would be so...so _careless_ in their courtship of you. The utter cretins. Not knowing what they had, not knowing the absolute treasure it is to even be allowed in your presence.”

“It was pretty good pizza,” Rey mumbled, unsure of what to do with the lengthy speech. It tugged at her heart in a way she wasn’t sure she liked, a whisper building in the back of her mind that spoke of _maybe he does care about me, maybe he really does want to be with me, maybe this isn’t just a flimsy excuse to hide that he assumes he’ll get bored of me._ “...Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me.” Poe cleared his throat and turned onto her street, driving more slowly as he scanned the road. “I beg you, please do not thank me for merely stating the truth.”

“Alright.” On impulse, Rey reached over to squeeze his shoulder, and Poe inhaled sharply, an oddity considering he didn’t need to breathe (something she was still endlessly fascinated by - she often hounded him with questions of _how far can you swim?_ and _what’s the longest sentence you can say without having to pause_?)

She spoke again when he parked outside her house, in the little spot reserved for her guests, that always went unused. “Poe?”

“Yes?” She could feel his eyes on her face, and she tried not to admit to herself that it felt a whole lot like burning alive.

“Does that mean you’d want to be..a paramour?” She half-smiled at him. “Of mine?”

He didn’t speak right away, but he slowly reached out, giving her time to pull away, and tucked her hair behind her ear, leaving his palm ever so gently to brush against her cheek, a whisper of contact that she leaned into on instinct.

“I would want so much more than that.” He looked immediately contrite and pulled away, sighing to himself. Rey fumbled with her seatbelt as he got out of the car, and by the time she unbuckled, Poe had her door open, and was glaring down the street, scanning ceaselessly. He offered her his hand, which Rey accepted, but not from any interest of increasing her own security or helping herself stand. No, she accepted his hand for a selfish reason, wanting to prolong their contact for as long as possible.

“I have to” - Poe reached around her carefully and pressed the button to lock the car, and Rey froze, appreciating fully how much broader Poe was than her as he curved around her. “Forgive me.”

“Nothing to forgive,” Rey said earnestly, her senses almost overcome by his proximity, the smell she’d only caught at his home weeks ago, something unplaceable but deeply attractive.

“Would you allow me to intrude upon your time a little longer, so I may walk you to your gate?” Poe gestured behind her, and Rey nodded, slipping her hand through his arm.

“You may.” She desperately tried to think _friends, friends, friends, this is what friends do,_ but to no avail. Her traitorous heart picked up pace, and she prayed to all the pagan gods who she apparently was connected to that somehow Poe and his intensely heightened senses didn’t pick up on _that_ or any other bodily changes she was certainly experiencing at this moment.

When they reached her yard, Rey rested her hand on the wood of her fence and looked over at Poe thoughtfully. He stepped away from her and half-bowed, his head ducking almost bashfully as he began to wish her a goodnight.

“If I were to” - Rey interrupted him, and he looked up nervously - “Invite...someone like you into my home, how would I do that?”

Poe startled and looked around wildly before pointing at himself with wide eyes.

“No, the other vampire I’m friendly with.” Rey snorted and rolled her eyes. “I’m talking about you, obviously.”

He exhaled shakily and smiled at her. “You would merely say” - he reached out to take her hand, and Rey wondered if this were part of the permission giving, or if he just wanted to hold her hand - “I invite you, Poe Dameron, into my home.”

“I invite you, Poe Dameron, into my home.” Rey reached behind her and pushed the gate open, not breaking eye contact with Poe, and she pulled him over the threshold by their joined hands. Neither one dared breathe as his feet crossed the boundary, and then the gate was shut behind him, and Poe was smiling bashfully.

“You honor me. I bid you goodnight.” He bowed to her and turned to leave, but Rey snorted.

“No, I want you to - c’mon, you can actually come in. Like come in to my actual house.” She pointed at her front door, and Poe looked taken aback.

“Are you quite-”

“If you ask me if I’m sure, I’ll scream.” Rey walked towards her front door, hoping that he’d actually follow her. She couldn’t hear him, but that was probably more a side effect of his nature than anything else; when she turned the key to her door, Poe was at her side, looking acutely nervous. “After you.”

He was immediately impeded, but not by any sort of curse - the black cat was a streak of fur as it came barreling down the stairs, spitting mad and its eyes glowing preternaturally. “Down!” Rey laughed as it jumped at Poe. “No, no, he’s a friend!’

“Mraow!” The cat wound around her feet when she walked in, and sat between her legs, growling softly at Poe, who still stood on the outside of the door.

“You big bully. I invited him in! He’s nice.”

“I’ve been called many things, but nice is not one of them.”

“Not helping my case, there, Dameron.”

Eventually, the black cat calmed down enough to allow Poe to enter, and he did so, eyeing the doorframe warily as he crossed over. His expression was one of intense relief and gratitude upon entering her home, and he stood on her mat, his jacket clutched in his hands. Rey closed the door behind him and shooed the cat towards the kitchen; it took a few steps away from them but then turned to glare at Poe reproachfully.

“Sorry about that.” Rey held her hand out for Poe’s jacket, and she hung the cool leather up on the hook behind the door.

“Don’t apologize, the beast is right.” Poe was smiling again, but his eyes were sad. “You do me an incredible honor, Ms. Smith, one that I’m not certain I’ve done much to earn.”

“Whatever. I’m ordering Chinese - you want some?” She turned towards the kitchen to grab her takeout menus. “I’ll even tell them you’re garlic sensitive.”

“...In that case, I wouldn’t say no to some General Tso’s Chicken.”

“Awww, I also love sauce-covered chicken nuggets.” Poe humphed behind her, indicating that he was still following her. Even though her floorboards were creaky, Poe didn’t make a sound as he walked through the house. It was a little eerie, and Rey figured it was just some latent instinct telling her to be slightly creeped out by it.

The cat hissed at Poe once more when they entered the kitchen, but Rey shushed him and knelt to scratch behind his ears. “Poe is a friend,” she reminded the cat gently. “I invited him in of my own free will. He’s a friend.”

When she stood, she saw a strange expression on Poe’s face, impossible to untangle, but she focused on grabbing the menu from the fridge and offering it to Poe to peruse.

After they’d ordered enough food to feed four people - “You will find that I cannot eat much human fare,” Poe had pointed out to her, to which Rey had snorted and reminded him that most of the food was for herself - they went to the living room, and Rey settled on the couch.

Poe, however, stood in the corner near the fireplace and studied each item in the room from a distance, with a clear and obvious interest on his face. His eyes lingered on her haphazard piles of books, on her abandoned mending pile, on her collection of plants near the window - his lips twitching at the homey burst of green - and lastly, on her two photos, one of her in her fifth grade pageant, and the other of her graduating with her MLIS.

 _I don’t have any other photos of myself,_ she wanted to say. _Side effect of being a foster kid - a teacher took the first photo, and my advisor took the second._ But, that was a little too heavy for the hot vampire you sometimes did research with but mostly just wanted to climb like a tree.

Poe made no move to vacate his corner, his eyes now trained on a spot on her wall, and he looked almost...tortured, his eyes fluttering with something, and his hands clenching at random into fists.

“Are you okay?”

He looked over to her, now guilty, and nodded tersely, his jaw working over something.

“Seriously, what’s wrong?” If she didn’t know any better, she’d say his cheeks were flushed.

“This room - this house - it all…” Poe cleared his throat and averted his eyes back to the blank space on the wall. “It smells like you. All of it. It is...overwhelming.”

 _Oh._ “I’m sorry.”

Poe huffed a laugh, his lips twitching briefly. “It is not something you need to apologize for. Merely something I need to… control.” Rey looked at him more closely, squinting slightly, and her heart staggered because it wasn’t simply bloodlust that reigned in his expression. It was an entirely human kind of lust.

“Do you want to - read something?” Rey picked up a book from her coffee table and held it out. “It might distract you.” Her ears burned as she blushed from the knowledge that this man definitely wanted to devour her, in more ways than one. Her hand trembled slightly as she offered him the book.

“Of course.” Poe smiled gratefully at her and accepted the book, perching on her coffee table lightly. He flipped open to a page she had saved. “Ah. A spellbook?”

“I’ve been trying to, you know” - she gestured vaguely - “But since that time I gave myself the nosebleed, I haven’t really been able to do anything.”

“Summoning Charms.” Poe nodded and swept his finger across the page. “Perhaps if there were something you truly wanted to summon?”

“I mean, it could be motivation that’s the issue.” Rey sighed. “Pick something out, and I’ll try.”

Poe looked around briefly and then indicated the ball of yarn in her basket across the room. Rey stared at it, trying to recall the precise incantation that was in the book Poe held, and she felt the rest of the room slip away slightly in her intense focus.

After several minutes, all that happened was a headache. Rey glowered and rubbed her temples, and Poe flipped through the book for a different spell.

“It’s not worth it,” Rey muttered. “I can’t do magic.”

“And that’s why you have dittany?” Poe pointed at her herbs in the window, and Rey frowned.

“I just use it for burns and cuts and things.” Rey shrugged, not getting his point. “It’s a healing plant.”

“For stomachaches, yes.” Poe smiled at her, looking vaguely victorious. “But to use it to heal ailments of the skin - that’s not so common.” He snapped the book shut and hummed to himself. “I think perhaps you are starting with the wrong kind of spell. You might be a green witch.”

“A green witch?” Rey lifted an eyebrow at him.

“It would make sense, if the prophecy is true.” Poe continued as though talking to himself. “And if Kylo Ren sought to pervert your natural magic…You garden is magnificent. Have you always had a gift for growing things?”

“No idea.” Rey frowned at her clasped hands. “I don’t know enough about my past. I wasn’t really allowed to grow anything until I was in college, and I just figured I had a green thumb.”

Poe gave her a meaningful look. “You should look for the witch you sent you their familiar. Perhaps they could help you find more about yourself?”

“You think?”

“Witchcraft is normally genetic.” Poe looked out the window towards her garden thoughtfully. “And someone as powerful as you - I doubt you came from nowhere.”

 _A nobody, from nowhere,_ her past whispered to her, and Rey shook herself.

“Alright.” She turned on the couch to eye the cat that sat, on guard, glaring at Poe. “I think I have an idea of who sent him.”

“You do?”

“Mhm.” Rey tapped her fingers on the cushion thoughtfully. “I’ve had a sneaking suspicion for a while. I’ll find out for sure tomorrow.”

***

“Hey, Ben.” Rey sidled up next to her mentor at the Information desk, and Ben smiled kindly at her. “How are you?”

“Very well, my dear, how are you?”

“Fine, fine.” She sighed dramatically. “My cat ate all my shoes, though.”

“He did?” Ben gave her a sideways glance. “I wasn’t aware you owned a cat.”

“I don’t.” Rey shrugged and slipped her hands into the pockets of her jumper. “But, he sort of … showed up at the blue one day, and I kinda just kept letting him.”

“How delightful. I’ve always had a fondness for cats.” Ben logged off his computer and walked away from the desk, and Rey scurried after him.

“Do you wanna see a picture of him?” Rey pulled her phone out and opened up her camera roll. “He’s a real cutie.”

“Of course, my dear.” Ben pulled his glasses out of his front pocket and put them on as Rey began to scroll through the three dozen pictures she’d snapped of the cat last night.

“And, here he is eating my shoes.” The cat, sure enough, was attacking her Keds, gnawing on them viciously, his eyes twitching slightly as he nibbled on the canvas and rubber.

“He always did love shoes.” Ben smiled fondly, and then immediately caught himself. “I mean-”

“Oh, so you think he’s pretty...familiar?” Rey pursed her lips and squinted up at Ben, who sighed and gestured to his office.

“In here, if you don’t mind.”

Once they were safely inside with the door closed, Ben frowned at her. “How long have you known?”

“Not long. I’ve had a suspicion for about a month.”

“Does this mean you know...everything?”

“Yes.” Rey crossed her arms in front of her chest. “Why did you send the cat to me?”

“If you know everything, you know why I would be worried about you. Arty was merely a precaution. You seem to be collecting demons of the underworld left and right. Like your friendly patron, for instance.”

“Poe is not a demon,” Rey snapped. “He’s a good man.” She blushed when Ben quirked an eyebrow at her. “Fine, I mean, I know he’s a vampire, but he’s not… a bad vampire. That’s not the point! The point is - how did you know about me?”

“You mean, how did I know you were a witch?” Ben settled behind his desk and tented his fingers. “I had my suspicions the moment I met you. My kind of magic - it has a heightened sensitivity to our kind; I can sense the resonance of others’ magic, others’ nature. You felt...different from anyone I’d ever met. Well. Almost everyone.”

“Does that mean…” Rey’s knees felt weak, and she staggered to the chair across from him. “You knew - did you know my parents?”

“I wasn’t aware of who you were for awhile.” Ben studied his hands and did not answer her question right away; Rey grit her teeth and tried not to scream. “No, I just figured you and she were of the same kind. It wasn’t until the prophecy that…”

“You know of the prophecy too?” Rey dragged her hand through her messy hair, pulling it out of the bun she’d scraped it into earlier. “God, who doesn’t know?”

“I am friends with the keeper of the prophecy, Lor San Tekka. He messaged me after your...friend...visited him, and let me know what was happening. I’ve increased my surveillance since, especially after the First Order attacked you last month.”

“You knew about that?” Ben gave her a look of exasperation, and Rey muttered an apology. “Right. Of course you knew. It’s your library. But - please, you said, _she._ Did you know my mother?”

“Yes.” The world around her seemed to freeze, and Rey’s breath hitched in her throat. “I did, a long time ago. She was very important to a friend of mine, and a very powerful witch.”

“A green witch,” Rey said softly, recalling what Poe had hypothesized last night.

“That’s right.” Ben smiled at her, and it was slightly sad. “You’ve done your research. Yes, your mother was... _eventually…_.a green witch - and a clairvoyant.”

“Please.” Rey licked her bottom lip, her fingers tightening against the edge of her seat. “What was she like? What was her name? Tell me, please-”

“Your mother’s name” - Ben tilted back in his chair and studied Rey’s face quietly for a long moment - “was Mara Jade.”

***

“Are you sure about this?” Rey pulled the hood up further over her head and eyed Poe through the smattering of rain that began to fall.

“No.” He sighed and offered her his arm. “Please do not talk to anyone - they will be able to tell that you are a witch, but if they glean any additional information on you, it could be … disastrous.”

“What kind of disastrous?”

“Not to be melodramatic, but Apocalypse-level disastrous.” Poe was definitely smirking when she glanced over at him as they swept towards the dingy bar, set back in the far corner of Jakku towards the wilds.

“And you wanted me to stay home.”

“It’s not too late,” he muttered, and Rey rolled her eyes.

“How come humans don’t see this place?” Rey asked as they approached the door.

“It’s a fae tavern,” Poe explained for the tenth time, but not sounding irritated for having to repeat himself. “They made it so that only those that walk in their world can see it.”

“So the fact that I can see it-”

“Is just another indicator that you are not fully human, yes.” Poe sighed and held the door for her. “I might not be...on my best behavior in here.”

“That’s quite alright.” Rey waggled her eyebrows at him as she walked in - he caught her wrist as she went to lower her hood, and he shook his head at her. “I want to see you behaving badly.”

“You say that now,” he murmured in her ear, and Rey fought back a gasp at how her stomach constricted.

They made their way to the bar, where Poe ordered two of what looked like vodka tonics. He watched the bartender pour both drinks, and he slid some odd pieces of currency across the counter towards him. “My treat,” he said, smiling at Rey, and she gasped, yet again.

His teeth, always perfect and white and even, had elongated frightfully; and, in the dim lighting of the tavern, she could see that his eyes had become golden and almost iridescent, catching the light in fascinating ways.

“Thank you,” she stammered, trying not to stare at his fangs.

“Sorry.” He leaned in to murmur softly to her, and Rey shivered at their proximity - she knew he leaned in so they wouldn’t be overheard, but this was honestly messing with her head, and some other things as well. “I didn’t meant to frighten you, but there’s no point in hiding what I am in here.”

“It’s alright,” Rey whispered back, turning to speak to him - their noses almost brushed, and she thought she felt rather faint. “I was just surprised.” Poe’s eyes were heavy on her face while he studied her, but eventually he nodded and they got up from the bar and started to walk through the crowd.

Someone was singing in what Rey was fairly sure was Gaelic, and as they began to wind through the crowd, Poe greeted several strange folk - all with oddities that marked them as just barely not human, whether it was strange teeth, or purple eyes, or green skin - in a variety of languages. Some were immediately recognizable as French, and Italian, and what she thought was ancient Greek or Latin, but others were entirely foreign to her.

“What was that?” She asked, after one of Poe’s conversational partners wandered away, a tail poking out from under his kilt.

“A language of the fair folk,” Poe explained quietly. He wrapped his arm around Rey’s waist and held her close to his body. “Stay close to me, please. He wanted to know if I would trade you for information.”

“I’d break his nose if he tried,” Rey reminded Poe, not bothering to keep her voice down, and the look Poe gave her was utterly proud, his golden eyes flashing, his sharp teeth glinting as he grinned somewhat evilly.

“I have no doubts, cara mia.”

Eventually, they were separated, when a shifty looking creature (that Poe identified to her as an ogre) informed Poe that he’d only speak to him about the First Order one-on-one. He nodded, looking at Rey nervously, before sliding into the booth. Rey faded as well as she could into the crowd, heading towards the opposite wall of the tavern.

With the wall behind her back, Rey turned to survey the rest of the crowded bar; she was only alone for a few seconds though, as a handsome man with strange green eyes approached her, a smile on his full lips.

“Hello,” he greeted her, an Irish accent evident in his smooth baritone. “I have never seen you before.”

“You wouldn’t,” Rey answered, trying to keep her voice low, and her eyes averted from him - but it was nearly impossible not to look at him. His hair was golden and curly, long enough to brush his shoulders which were somehow both slim and broad. He was tall, looming more than a head and a half over her, and his clothes fit him obscenely well. She found herself blushing. “I came with my friend.”

“You came with your friend?” He leaned in to smile at her. “What friend?”

There was a faint buzzing in Rey’s ears as she tried to focus on the question. “I beg your pardon?”

“Your friend,” the man repeated, his smile growing more fond, more affectionate, and Rey thought she wanted him to smile like that forever. “Tell me, beautiful, who is your friend? Where is he, that he would leave you all alone amongst such wicked folk?”

“He’s…” Rey shook her head, clearing it slightly and frowned at him. The man looked taken aback to see her frowning, and that made her scowl. “He’s right there.” She jabbed her finger across the tavern to where Poe was sitting, and she could see him stiffen and look over at her and her new companion.

“Ah, I see. A nightwalker.” He studied her with renewed interest. “And what, pray tell, is a little thing like you doing with a nightwalker?”

“I’m not little,” Rey growled, pulling herself up to her full height.

“No, I suppose you aren’t.” The man’s smile only deepened, and Rey fought against her instincts to just _trust him, talk to him, he’s perfectly lovely_ \- “What is your name, by the way?”

“Rey.” It slipped out before she could stop it, and Rey clapped a hand to her mouth in horrified surprise.

“Rey.” The smile grew slightly wicked, but no less attractive. “That’s not quite what I was looking for. What’s your _real_ name?”

“My - my real name?”

“Your full name. Your true name.” He whispered into her ear, and Rey wondered when he’d gotten this close in the first place. “I should very much like to know who you are.”

“Me too.” Rey shoved him away slightly and glowered at him. “I told you my name though. I don’t have more than that.”

“I suppose you don’t.” He studied her thoughtfully. “I like you, Rey. I could help you find the rest of your name, if you like.” He held a slender, long hand out to her, and Rey considered it. “Come with me?”

“I-”

“Get away from her.” Poe had returned from his discussion with the ogre who might be in organized magical crime. He put a hand on the man’s chest and pushed, hard. “She doesn’t want to go with you.”

“Why don’t you let her answer?” The man smirked at Rey, who felt a strange tugging at the front of her mind.

“No, he’s right, I’m good.” Rey tucked herself into Poe’s side, slightly more than relieved to see him again. His body was almost vibrating when she felt it, though, and she looked at him with concern.

“Are you sure?” The voice was back, the irresistible baritone that made Rey want to close her eyes. “I only want to-”

“Go.” Poe snarled the word, and Rey could feel the tension in his body reach an impossible height, palpable through his jumper and jacket. “ _Aos Sí._ ”

The man bowed to Rey and smirked at Poe, clearly unfazed by the fangs that elongated by the second. “Until we meet again, fair one.” He vanished through the crowd, impossible to follow, and Rey breathed out slowly, her head suddenly much less muddled.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I don’t know what came over me -”

“He was a fae,” Poe explained, cupping her cheek softly. “What did he say to you?”

“He wanted to help me...learn my name.” Rey frowned, trying to remember what else was said, but her mind was too cloudy. “Or maybe he wanted to know it?”

“Did you tell him?” Poe repeated the question when she didn’t answer straight away, his other hand coming to frame her face. “Did you?”

“I told him my first name,” Rey answered, frowning into space over Poe’s shoulder. “But...he seemed to think that wasn’t good enough. Said it wasn’t...right. Wasn’t real.”

“Thank the powers for that.” Poe stroked his hand down her neck, and Rey stiffened slightly, stirred from her cloudiness by the proximity. “If a fae learns your true name, sweetheart, it can be the sort of disastrous I told you about when we walked in here.”

“You should have warned me,” Rey grumbled.

“I didn’t think we’d meet an _actual_ fae. They created places like this, yes, portals between worlds, but they rarely come out from their realm these days.” Poe scowled in the direction the man had disappeared in. “I’m shocked to have seen one.”

“He seemed nice.” Rey felt more than embarrassed at this point, so she fell back on irritation. “Why couldn’t I - I can ignore vampire’s glamour, so what’s different about him?”

“It’s an older magic,” Poe explained, wrapping an arm around her and guiding her towards the front of the tavern. “Much, much older than my kind. I wouldn’t be surprised if your new friend was ten times older than I am.”

“He looks great for five thousand,” Rey joked. “Dermatologists must hate him.”

“If you’re quoting memes, I suppose you’re feeling alright now.” Poe signaled the bartender for a water, and he handed it to Rey, smirking at her look of surprise. “Yes, I know what memes are. I’ve lived for half a millenium, I’m not dumb.”

“That’s exactly what an old man would say.”  

They stood there for a few moments while Rey collected herself, and more than one patron looked their way in this time. Poe scowled at all of them ferociously until they looked away, and Rey rolled her eyes at him. “They’re weirded because we’re not doing normal club things,” she pointed out.

“What do you mean?” Poe looked confused, and Rey laughed sweetly at him.

“Look at most people in here - they’re gambling, or chatting with different species, or dancing. We’re just talking to random people here and there, and almost ripping their heads off.”

“I would not have ripped his head off.” Poe frowned at the counter. “An arm would have sufficed.”

“Yeah, well.” Heat raced through Rey’s veins as she took a chance and tugged on Poe’s hand, setting her empty glass on the bar. “Dance with me?”

“Dance with you?” Poe looked at her with mild alarm, and Rey smiled winningly at him. They weren’t going to glean any more information while Poe was worked up - his fangs were still fully out, his eyes an uncanny shade of yellow, and not the gold they were before - and while they were attracting too much information.

 _This is for the mission,_ Rey thought sternly to herself, tugging on Poe’s hand some more. “C’mon.”

Poe followed her to where an assortment of patrons were dancing in the middle of the tavern to the fiddle being played by a man whose horns Rey was determined not to stare at. It was a fascinating melody, blending more classic strains of folk music with modern syncopation, with an unworldly reverberation that mimicked synth music. Rey, who’d never really had the inclination to dance before, was unable to resist, especially with her option for a partner.

“I haven’t danced since the seventies,” Poe confessed to her, after she’d looped her arms around his neck and started to sway to the rhythm. His hands hesitated for a moment before she nodded, and they rested on her waist; she stepped in as close as she dared, and rationalized it was to better speak to Poe in the din.

“The seventies?” Rey grinned, not pulling back to look at his face, and instead resting her chin on his shoulder. “...Did you _disco_?”

“Saturday night fever, darling.” Poe surprised her by pulling her arms from around her neck, taking her hands, and spinning her away from him and then back towards him. Rey laughed wildly, and the music surged as though in tandem with her emotions. It became faster, and the couples around them switched to a form of dancing that would have gotten them kicked out of her Year 13 proms. Rey placed her arms back around Poe’s neck and looked around the dance floor - no one was watching them, and she was able to more easily pinpoint people who were _not_ doing anything lighthearted or carefree.

“This is not what I imagined.” Poe spoke quietly enough that Rey could have misheard him.

“What isn’t?” She looked into his eyes with concern, and saw that he looked almost...embarrassed.

“For our first dance.” His hands were firm on her waist, and Rey stepped in to hear him better, inadvertently brushing against his chest - his hands tightened immediately. “I imagined something...a little different.”

“What, like a waltz?”

“Something like that.” Poe ignored her teasing tone and answered seriously, his eyes once more a fascinating gold. “I imagined many things - but nothing quite like this.”

Rey pressed against him a little more to whisper in his ear, her hands sliding down to grip his solid biceps. “Is this really so bad?” She asked more in shyness than coquettery.

“I guess not.” Poe’s throat moved a great deal before he continued. “I like this as well.”

She smiled to herself in quiet victory, but a figure over Poe’s shoulder caught her attention; she gasped in recognition as their face grew more apparent.

“What is it?” Poe stiffened and made to turn around, but Rey shook her head quickly.

“I’ve seen that man before.” She squinted through the darkness and frowned. “I’m not sure where.”

“Maybe at the library?” Rey frowned and shook her head again.

“That’s not it.” The memory of his face - round, pale, with a strong widow’s peak - stood out to her through a haze, and her mind raced to place it. It clicked in with terrifying clarity. “Oh my God.” She didn’t miss the way Poe flinched at the epithet. “Sorry, sorry.”

“It’s okay,” he stroked a hand down her back soothingly, and Rey realized they were still dancing - and all for the best, for the man continued to move towards the back of the tavern, not realizing he’d been detected. “Who is it, sweetheart?”

“I’ve seen him in my dreams.” Rey’s throat was dry, and she was relieved that Poe wouldn’t mock her for such a silly thing to say. He swore violently under his breath, so she knew he’d caught her meaning. “He’s...he’s with Kylo.”

“The First Order’s been here this whole time?” Poe searched over his shoulder, as Rey was unable to stop him. “Here, let’s-” He guided her to the wall, and Rey watched, fascinated, as he seemed to grow taller.

“How did you-”

“Simple magic.” Poe shrugged and smiled at her. “It is stronger in here, where the veil between worlds is thinner. It is the only reason you perceive it as real. You would see right through it out there.” He jerked his head towards the front exit of the tavern, and Rey nodded. “My hope is that they haven’t seen us yet.”

Rey peered around his arm, which had come up to block her partially from view. “I don’t think so.”

A group of men, with the pale-faced man in the middle, were casting glances their way, from their position near the back door. Another small group had appeared near the front of the tavern.

“They wouldn’t pick a fight in the middle of all these people, would they?”

As if to answer her question, a small number of the vampires in the back broke off and began to weave through the crowd.

“Damn it.” Poe offered Rey his hand, and they rushed along the edge of the crowd. “Here’s, there’s a side exit” - he gestured to a door in the wall that Rey hadn’t noticed before - “I’ve been coming here a while, it’s normally hidden to patrons.”

He wrapped an arm around Rey, and guided her to do the same, all the while looking over his shoulder to determine how close the First Order goons were getting. “They’re - I don’t see them.” Rey whispered, after she looked back as well, when they were almost to the door.

“Because they are most likely waiting for us outside.” Poe cleared his throat and looked at Rey with an intensity she’d only seen a few times. “You can wait in here - I cannot promise you safety, but you might be able to disappear in the melee. They will be able to recognize me, first. I have been their enemy for a long time.”

“What? I’m not leaving you!” Rey glared up at him, and Poe’s lips twitched into a smile, even as his fangs burst forth once more, a scarlet gleam catching at his irises. She swallowed hard and tried to tell herself it was frightening - but she didn’t find it frightening. “If you’re going to fight, so will I.”

“My valkyrie.” Poe’s thumb stroked along her side, and Rey tried to remember that they were about to fight for their lives, and that it was not an appropriate time to kiss the man she’d swore to _just stay friends_ with. That idea seemed incredibly absurd now that they were both likely to die - or really, if she were being honest, he would die, and she would be taken to God knew where. “Reach into the inside of my jacket. The first pocket.”

She followed his instruction and found a hidden, sharp object - she pulled it free to see that it was a wooden stake, much more sophisticated and dangerous-looking than the one she’d used to kill Kylo’s right-hand man last month. “What will you use?” Rey asked worriedly, as Poe gripped the door handle, staring out at the crowd one last time.

“I have another.” He pulled it from his jacket and pulled the side open so that Rey could see the assortment of weaponry he had on his person. “A good vampire knows to always be prepared.”

“Pretty sure that’s the Boy Scouts.”

“You’re probably right.” Poe reached out to frame her face tenderly with his roughened palm, his gaze soft even while his eyes still glinted with their unholy shade. “I beg the universe that you will survive this.”

“You too.” Rey grabbed his wrist before he could pull away and kissed his palm quickly. A thumb brushed across her cheek delicately, and then he pulled away, kicking the door open.

“Stay behind me,” he ordered, exiting the building, his weapon tight in his grip already.

Rey didn’t even have to ask when it would happen - immediately, the door slammed shut behind them (when she turned, Rey watched it fade back into brick), and four of them melted from the shadows - the sun had gone down while they were inside, and the rain had only picked up. With only a single, flickering light above from a nearby streetlamp, Poe held a hand out behind him to signal to her to stay back, and he walked forward while Rey hefted the stake warily in her hand.

“Lord Ren sends his regards, bellator.” Rey couldn’t tell which of the four spoke through the rain, but she could see that Poe did not lower his weapon. “And he thanks you for caring for his bride.” Revulsion coursed through Rey’s veins as the meaning sank in.

“Why don’t you leave, and tell Ren that he has no business here?” Poe suggested, his voice icy - he still seemed larger than normal, and he also appeared to be vibrating again, as though bristling with rage. The other four seemed more impassive.

“We will leave, once we have the girl.” Another spoke this time, and they closed ranks around them. Poe stepped back to block one’s path to Rey, and she eyed the one furthest to her right, who now had a more clear path. _This is … bad._ “There is no need for you to be harmed, bellator. Lord Ren has long respected the best warrior in the Resistance.”

“I am not a warrior.” Poe moved smoothly to the right, glaring at the one approaching Rey from the side. “Ren knows this.”

“Ah, yes, Organa’s pet scholar, the tamed nightwalker.” A third voice chimed in, and Rey could see which one spoke now, as they grew ever nearer. “Do you think she will mourn for you?”

“Will Ren mourn for you?”

None countered this, as instead they all lunged forward - Rey had trouble following their movements through the rain, the growing dark, and their own terrifying speed, but she could tell Poe moved faster than all four, his weapon flying through the air quickly to stake the one closest to her. He reached into his jacket and removed what looked like a silver mace, and swung it in a vicious arc, catching another on the jaw. It howled in pain and collapsed, and Poe darted forward to reclaim the stake from the now disintegrated victim, and swung it to strike the second in the chest.

Now only two remained, and this had happened in less than twenty seconds - Rey shrieked in surprise as something grabbed her arm - a fifth vampire had approached unnoticed, clearly having hung back during the intial assault.

“Rey!” Poe shouted her name desperately, but the two remaining vampires seized him, pulling him down to the ground, and Rey screamed his name now as she watched them tear at him.

“You will be Lord Ren’s bride,” hissed the creature that held her, and Rey snorted in disbelief.

“Oh, fuck off!” Her fear for Poe shot through her veins in the most powerful surge of adrenaline she’d ever experienced, and she kicked the one gripping her arm savagely, striking it just under the knee. To her surprise - and its surprise, no doubt - it knocked the thing backwards, and Rey hefted her stake in her hand, the bulk of it a satisfying weight on her palm, and drove the point through the vampire’s heart. Not even waiting for it to perish, Rey stormed forward, rushing through the rapidly forming puddles, towards the tangle of limbs and snarling Poe had disappeared into.

She grabbed one First Orderling by the back of its neck and hauled it backwards just slightly enough to stake it through the back, but another rushed forward from the darkness to join the brawl. “How many of you fuckers are there?” She asked in disbelief, even as it lunged at her.

“We are legion!”

“You’re fucking annoying.” It wrapped its arms around Rey’s chest and hauled her backwards - distantly, she could hear Poe calling out for her in terror - but she felt rage snap, brittle and infinite, in her chest.

“Let go of me,” she commanded, her voice not sounding like her own. Of course, the vampire didn’t relent, and Rey snarled, shoving backwards - but not with her arms or legs. Something inside of her reached out, weaving through the particles of time and space and essence that separated her from her would-be captor - and with a horrifying snap, the thing flew away from her, its arms drooping as though she’d cut the strings to a puppet.

Its neck was already broken when she turned to study it, and it was only a matter of staking it before she was able to return her attention to the battle Poe was locked in, with the largest of the original vampires.

“Get away from him!” She raised her hand as she rushed forward, her voice still strange to her own ears, and she could see the universe stretching and bending between them - but no time to panic about _that_ , as the raindrops slowed around her, and the ground shifted beneath her feet. No time to assess why that was as she envisioned seizing the attacker, and it in fact lifted from the ground, away from Poe, and soared towards her and her waiting stake.

With a burst of sulphurous flame, it disintegrated as well, and Poe sat up coughing and rubbing his neck.

“What the fuck?” He croaked, stumbling to his feet and towards her. Rey stared at Poe with incredulity, and then burst out laughing. “Are you alright? Is - did they-” He seized her by the arms and searched her desperately, no doubt looking for a wound or worse, a bite mark.

“No.” Rey gasped for breath, and Poe patted her sides anxiously. “No, _no_ \- I’m fine, I’m - I’m laughing.”

“It is a perfectly normal response to fight-or-flight to-”

“No.” Rey interrupted him gently, smiling at him, even as her blood continued to pound through her veins. “No, I’ve just...never heard you curse before, I don’t think. It sounded - “ she giggled, a little more hysterically than normal. “Ridiculous.”

“Really?” Poe managed to smile back at her, even if it were a little worried. “Ridiculous?”

“It was like hearing Mr. Darcy drop the f-bomb.” Rey’s giggles slowed as Poe’s concern didn’t fade from his face. “I’m fine though, really. Not a scratch on me.”

“Thank the maker,” Poe whispered. The stake Rey had been holding clattered to the ground, falling into a puddle, as she began to pat Poe’s chest and arms anxiously.

“Are you alright?” She eyed his body doubtfully. “They didn’t - I’m not sure, can a vampire be injured?”

“We can.” Poe didn’t pull away from her at all, and allowed her examination to continue. “But I did not receive injury, thanks to you.”

“Good.” Rey pressed her lips together, the singing in her blood reaching a fever pitch, as she fought against a sudden, uncontrollable urge. Her expression must have changed drastically, for worry returned to Poe’s eyes.

“Are you alright?” She was trembling now, in the increasing downpour, and Poe pushed wet hair from her eyes, leaving his palms on either side of her face. “Not just physically, of course, that must have been-”

“Kiss me.” The words slipped out before she could stop them, and Rey reached up to grab his wrists, to hold him there a little longer as she repeated her request. “Please, kiss me.”

“Rey, I-”

“We could have died,” she pointed out, desperately. “But we didn’t, and you said it yourself, I - I helped you. Clearly I can fight off your kind perfectly well, and I don’t know _what_ happened, but something about being in danger, I was able to - to - well, you saw. And - and I know you have your reasons, and they’re good reasons, but please, Poe, I want you to kiss me. I want to kiss you. I can handle myself, so can’t you just-”

Poe surrendered with a groan, and Rey sighed as his lips pressed to hers, effectively ending her ramble. It was sweeter than she’d imagined, Poe’s lips brushing against hers with an urgency but not a speed or force she’d come to expect from kisses. Instead, his mouth moved slowly, his hands migrating from her cheeks to her wet, tangled hair, as he angled her head for better access to her bottom lip.

Rey grabbed his arms with a whimper, a noise that only encouraged Poe to deepen the kiss further, his tongue swiping along her bottom lip; when she granted him entrance, she was pleased to discover that he tasted like peppermint and a bit like the drink they’d shared, but mostly like something ancient and familiar all at once. Rain continued to mingle with the kiss as his nose brushed against her cheek while seeking a new, more exciting angle. His thumbs were firm against the corner of her jaw, and Rey was all too aware of where her body made contact with his.

They stumbled backwards, unable to contain themselves any longer, and Rey was unsure if he guided her, or she pulled him, but they reached the wall - and either she jumped up, or he grabbed her legs, or some combination happened, because Poe picked her up and pressed her against the wall, holding her between his solid, warm body and the brick, and Rey gasped and dragged her hands through his hair and down his back.

The rain slowed without warning, and they both slowed their embrace to study each other. Poe looked up into her eyes with a suddenly shy smile, and Rey leaned down to kiss him, sweetly enough to match his smile.

“Hey,” she whispered.

“Hello.” Poe released her, and Rey slid along his body, pretending not to notice his barely restrained gasp, until her feet reached the ground. They stood in silence, dripping wet, the evidence of their battle almost entirely washed away in the rain; Poe grabbed one of her hands and began to kiss her cold, wet fingertips.

“Does this mean we’re still going to try to be friends?” Rey asked warily. Poe gazed at her, his expression unreadable. “Because I don’t think I can walk back from that.”

Poe snorted and then kissed the side of her head, holding her tenderly. “Let’s just” - he sighed into her hair, and held her tighter, and Rey nuzzled against his neck - “Go slowly?”

“Slowly it is.” She smiled at Poe though, overcome with a sense of joyous mischief, and he returned her smile albeit bashfully.

“What is it, sweetheart?”

“Oh, just…” Rey trailed her hand down his arm and smirked. “Does this make you my paramour?”

“Why, yes, I suppose it does.” Poe bowed with a flourish, making her giggle, and he kissed the air above her hand mid-bow. “Prepare to be courted, Ms. Smith.”

“You make it sound like such a hardship.” He stood and offered her his arm, and they walked from the alleyway together, towards the promise of safety on the regular street.

And, caught up as they were in the small bubble of hard-won happiness  they’d constructed for themselves, neither noticed the cold eyes studying them from the shadows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaaaaand that's the end of part one.....
> 
>  
> 
> the sequel to this fic would be  
> 1\. Steamy  
> 2\. Lore-heavy  
> 3\. Did I say steamy? Because I had to pause a few times while writing some of the scenes, as I literally overheated.
> 
> Anyway, thanks for reading, and for waiting for this final chapter! Let me know if you're still interested in the sequel, and how you liked Part One <3 <3


	6. Man Was Made for Joy & Woe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Poe and Rey progress in their relationship

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all,
> 
> I had intended this for my May the Fourth Countdown -- I don't know if you follow me on tumblr, but last week was particularly rough when a contingent of Anti-Damerey folk descended on my inbox and decided to make the SW fandom a very unhappy, unpleasant place to be.
> 
> Anyway, here's the next chapter of Vampire!Poe AU.
> 
> Happy Revenge of the Fifth

A cold day in early December found Poe once more at the Jakku Public Library, watching as their fair librarian poured over texts at the reference desk, a serene look of contentment on her lovely face. Her hands delicately turned the pages of fragile books, her concentration only broken when patrons approached her to ask questions; Rey was always happy to assist, he knew, but he stifled his laughter when he saw the mildly disgruntled expressions that crossed her face when she was interrupted. 

He sighed and rubbed his temple, the ghost of a headache forming; it had been centuries since he’d truly experienced any malady as mundane as a headache, but it seemed he suffered in sympathy to Rey, whose frustrations only increased as she searched for answers in  _ Shadowed Past: The Dark Crossroad of Jakku,  _ or,  _ Habentia Maleficia  _ as it was known to his kind. 

Her first interaction with that text had caused her to unknowingly summon Death, so he hoped that she had taken his warnings to heart and was limiting herself to discovering the origins of the dark ones who would eventually form the imperial vampiric forces that dominated most of the world for millennia. 

Poe lived (un-lived?) for the moments when she would pause in her perusal to glance over the heavy tome and smile at him, a warm, beautiful smile that caused the dimple in her cheek to appear. How he longed to cross the floor of the library and kiss her in sight of all the other patrons, to hold her tightly to him as he continued the explorations they had been so hesitant in enacting these past few weeks since they progressed from being simply friends.

And simply friends he would have been content to remain; the appearance of the First Order had given him cause for vexation over the last few weeks, but, without their untimely arrival at the bar and the subsequent attack, he and Rey would have never experienced the surge of adrenaline that led to their first, ferocious kiss in the rain.

If vampires could blush -- 

Rey smirked when she caught him staring at her, and he pushed away from his table with a sigh, intending to go flirt with the librarian, push his limits and boundaries a little more. It was a good way to wile away the afternoon, to stand at her desk, to hide how passionately he loved her in front of all these mortals, to test his ability to not drink the blood of the one person who had been able to get him to doubt his multi-century commitment to not turning anyone and dooming them to his fate, but his intention was quickly circumvented by a familiar face.

Ben Kenobi stood there, a smirk on his wrinkled face, arms crossed in front of his chest.

“May I help you, Mr. Dameron?”

“Uhh.” Poe glanced over Ben’s shoulder and saw that Rey was once again in engaged in conversation with a patron. She led them away from the reference desk, the click of her sensible shoes audible, at least to him, across the library. He sighed and was about to tell the older librarian he was fine when a thought occurred to him.

“Actually, yes.”

“Oh?” Ben lifted an eyebrow, clasping his hands behind his back as he studied Poe’s face. 

“I had a question.” 

“I hope that I have an answer.”

Ben’s expression remained, as always, cryptic, but Poe decided it needed to be talked about regardless of Ben’s potential disapproval. 

“May we speak in private?” Poe gestured to the row of offices near the front of the library, and Ben nodded graciously.

“By all means.” 

He walked to the door of his personal office, and Poe followed close behind; he took one last look over his shoulder and smiled at the sight of Rey balancing a number of heavy texts while talking animatedly to two teenagers who were clutching notebooks, no doubt completing research for school. 

When they had settled in their chairs, Poe across from Ben, and Ben sitting up on the taller of the seats (which couldn’t have been a mistake), Poe cleared his throat, suddenly at a loss for words.

“You had a question for me?” Ben asked politely, fixing them both a cup of tea from the small machine behind his desk. He set one in front of Poe and wrapped his hands around the other. After Poe didn’t make a move to either grab the cup or start talking, Ben sighed and took a delicate sip from his cup. “It’s not poisoned, Mr. Dameron.”

“I know that,” Poe mumbled. He liked to think that Ben wouldn’t want to upset his apprentice like that, but part of him did wonder if Ben would be able to dispatch him if … Well, that was why he was here today, wasn’t it? 

Poe picked up his saucer and took a tentative sip to polite; typically, he didn’t enjoy most mortal food, as it sat like a rock in his system until it dissolved naturally or he forced himself to expel it, but surprisingly, the tea was pleasant, a blend of herbs that were light and cleared his head, and Poe hummed appreciatively.

“Thank you.”

“It is no trouble.” Ben smiled at him. “I used to know one of your kind, and we were rather close. He enjoyed that brew as well.” 

“Who did you know?” Poe asked curiously, but Ben shook his head and smiled mysteriously.

“One question at a time, and I doubt that was the one you intended to ask when you walked into my office.”

“Very well, sir.” Poe bowed his head, and when he sat up straight, he set the cup down firmly on the desk and folded his hand in his lip. “I wished to seek your advice on a matter of law concerning both our races.”

“Oh?” Ben blinked and settled back in his chair. “Why seek my counsel, when your master is Leia Organa, one of the Oldest Ones, one of the Wisest? Even my kind respect her for her virtues and consider her nonpareil in terms of control and grace; she might be a better ear for your question.”

“Maybe,” Poe allowed, making himself sit as still as possible. “But...I would also prefer Leia not know about the quandary I find myself in until … until I knew the answer already. I -- she does not appreciate --” he shook his head, unable to go on, and they sat quietly for a few moments.

“It helps,” Poe began again, “that Rey is not truly a mortal, but a witch. And a Green Witch, at that -- we had thought they had died out in the last century.”

“Her mother was older than that.” Ben studied the wood of his desk carefully like he was scrying. “She did not have Rey until 1994, and by that point, she was on the run from the most dangerous organization that threatens both our species. She was unable to raise Rey in the ways of our kind, and due to an...interference … I was unable to keep an eye on her until she was out of college and came back to Jakku.”

“Does Rey know all this?” Poe asked.

Ben nodded. Poe ran a hand through his hair and sighed, deciding that he’d spent enough time beating around the bush.

“I suppose what I am trying to say is: what do you know of the laws surrounding vampire and witch … romances?”

There was a lengthy, painful pause, and then Ben lifted a finger. “Excuse me for a moment.”

He turned and stood from the desk, opening a small closet door that was built into the wall; he rummaged around for a few moments, and then returned with an object that made Poe blanche.

Ben set the massive, imposing crossbow -- already loaded with a bolt -- on the desk and sat down behind it, a hand on the weapon. “Continue.”

“Uh, I,” Poe blinked and pushed his chair slightly back. “I mean her no harm. You should know that, foremost, as should Rey. I have no intention to turn her, something she knows, but … I wish to know more about the laws before I tell Rey of them. She knows that vampire and witch pairings are  _ frowned  _ upon, but she does not know the extent, and if she did, she would most likely ignore them. I do not wish for her to be harmed because I cannot control myself, so tell me honestly: is there anyway around the law?”

“The law.” Ben huffed and shook his head, crossbow momentarily forgotten. “The law was written by bigots, of course, who feared the powerful outcome of a pairing of witches and vampires. Two magick bloods combining in one vessel; the Elders feared a loss of their power. The Elders are dead now, and many modern theorists posit that balance between the Old World and the New will only be attainable through mixed-species coupling.”

“So you believe we would not necessarily be punished if we proceeded as a ...couple?” Poe asked warily.

“Not necessarily. Our Council is more just than ever, and your own Leia sits upon it. Master Yoda, who represents the witches, is wise and a little more kind than the traditional judge, and I believe you would have a strong case if you were called before him; Rey told me of your battle with the First Order, and I could personally attest to your control and desire to maintain discretion in the modern world.”

“You would defend us?” Poe blinked in surprise; he had always assumed the old man didn’t care for him.

“I would defend her, and by extension, you,” Ben said gently. “That girl deserves some happiness, and perish the thought that I would be the one to stop her from being happy.”

Poe nodded, and then Ben stood; he followed suit, and they shook hands over the table.

“My boy, I would inform Rey of what we spoke about today. She is not a woman who would take kindly to being left in the dark.”

“Of course sir,” Poe bowed again, unable to stop the gesture at this point. “Thank you, sir.”

“Very well,” Ben sat down with a sigh and returned to typing at his computer, paying Poe no attention as he started to work.

Poe hurried from the office, recognizing a dismissal when he saw one.

***

A few nights later, he and Rey were curled up on her couch, rain pattering against the windows while Poe read from an ancient tome he’d brought from his own house. The witch’s cat purred happily in the corner, and Poe stroked his fingers up and down Rey’s arm, enjoying the small shivers it inspired in his darling. 

Rey was reading a text regarding the development of shadow organizations in the twentieth century; she chewed on her lip with such ferocity that Poe considered slipping his thumb between her lips and offering it in her abused flesh’s stead. 

She snapped her book shut when the small clock on her fireplace announced the time: ten p.m. He had overstayed his welcome, and he dropped his feet from the coffee table they’d been resting on to the floor, preparing to take his leave (hoping he might receive a kiss farewell). Instead of banishing him from her home, however, Rey looked up at him with wide eyes and a faint smirk. 

“What is it?” He asked, setting the book open on its spine on the coffeetable; Rey glowered at it for a moment, before returning her gaze to Poe’s face.

“I need a break,” she announced, wiggling into his side a little more.

“We’ve been reading for almost three hours,” Poe said, knowing that her eyes needed much more rest than his own. “If you need to sleep--”

“Not sleep.” Rey knelt on the couch, shifting quickly, and looked at him meaningfully. “I need a distraction.”

“Oh.” Poe considered this for a moment, looking into the soft, flickering flames of the fire before him; he didn’t know if it were the flames or the realization that made him feel so warm. “ _ Oh. _ ”

“Mhm.” Rey tugged on his sleeve slightly before retreating, and Poe turned to face her, mirroring her body language.

“I am not sure if … after what we spoke of earlier this week, regarding the law about vampires and witches...I am unsure … if us ... _ coupling, _ ” Poe was convinced at this point that vampires really  _ could  _ blush, at least, when they were faced with Rey Smith, “Is a good idea.”

“Coupling.” Rey snorted, her own face bright red now. “I just want to kiss you. If that’s okay?”

“More than okay,” Poe acceded, leaning into brush his lips over hers. It was a chaste, pleasant kiss, and he smiled into it, smiling deeper when Rey’s thin fingers curled into his collar and pulled him closer for a longer, less chaste kiss.

Her lips were soft, impossibly soft, as they moulded to his own, and Rey released a tiny sigh as he brought his hand up to cradle her jaw; he ran his thumb along the sharp line of it, pressing it slightly into the hollow between neck and jaw to change the angle of the kiss. Then, Rey very, very gently ran her tongue along his bottom lip, her own lips parting as she deepened the kiss successfully.

Immediately, the onslaught of her scent struck him, and Poe groaned, his free hand tightening into a fist as he tried to ignore how her blood sang to him. But, while her blood traditionally would inspire a frenzy in him, this frenzy seemed born of a different kind of lust altogether. He pressed into the kiss, pushing Rey back with the ferocity of his movements, but she seemed more than content to fall back against the couch, pulling him with her.

He was now cradled by her hips, all thoughts of propriety momentarily forgotten in his madness, in his need to be closer to her, to listen to the way her blood sang and revel in it, rather than run from it. Her pulse thrummed under his palm when he ran it down her neck, stopping when his fingers reached her collarbone. Fingers tangled in his hair as Rey held him closely, a soft noise of appreciation slipping out from her perfect, plush mouth while he continued plundering it.

A sense of horror washed over him when he realized how ungentlemanly his hips were acting, and he sat up quickly. 

“I apologize,” he said hastily, “You asked for a kiss, and I fear that was closer to a mauling--”

“Oh, please,” Rey huffed, her eyes glassy and skin flushed, an alluring image in and of itself, “Don’t give yourself so much credit, at least half the blame is on me--”

“None of the blame is on--”

“Don’t say that!” Rey prodded his chest with a finger, and he sat up all the way. She adjusted her sweater with a sigh, and Poe tried to settle himself by calling to mind the opening lines of Dante’s Inferno, the subject matter reminding him of his own eternal fate, the one he refused to chain Rey to in the event of a lapse in control. 

“There is no blame,” Rey said quietly, setting her feet on the floor once again. Poe followed her, and when she leaned into his side, he did not recoil, knowing she would take it as a rejection, and not a statement of his own fear that he might rob her of her mortality. “No blame at all. What we were doing was natural, Poe--”

“--The Council might not agree--”

“--And I refuse to apologize. You should too.”

He nodded, unable to argue with her when she spoke so passionately, and Rey shook her head. “I suppose this means you’ll say no to what I was planning on asking you?”

“And what would that be?” Poe delicately lifted her hand and brought her knuckles to his lips. 

“I was going to ask you to stay the night.”

Poe’s eyebrows lifted involuntarily, and he fought back a cough of surprise. 

“Not to have sex with you,” Rey rolled her eyes, noticing his reaction. “Although  _ that  _ was flattering reaction.”

“Please, do not think it a refusal based on disinterest,” Poe pleaded, his body aflame, and he wasn’t sure if it was merely metaphorical, “It is merely a fear for your--”

“Safety, got it.” Rey looked as though she were fighting back another eye roll. “No, I only meant … the texts suggest that Kylo might actually be able to cross over in the dreams, and they’ve been getting more vivid since Halloween.” 

At the sound of the First Order’s princeling’s name, any warm and treacherous feelings Poe might have had about his physical proximity to Rey vanished. He sat up straighter with a frown and studied her face carefully. 

“Are you truly afraid that he might attempt to lure you away in your sleep?’

Rey nodded, shrugging her slender shoulders with a well-controlled display of indifference, one he knew to be an attempt at convincing herself of her lack of fear. It didn’t quite work.

“And you think my staying here might circumvent such an event?”

She nodded again. “I just need someone to wake me up if...if something strange happens. Artoo has tried the last few times, but he can’t always be here, and…”

“Say no more.” Poe stroked his thumb over her knuckles and smiled at her warmly when she looked over. “Consider me your guardian tonight.” 

She snorted and rolled her eyes, pushing at his shoulder lightly before she rose and prepared for bed.

***

Rey slept restlessly, and Poe watched restlessly. 

He did not relish the vulnerability Rey displayed by sleeping in front of him and trusting him to pull her back from a nightmare; her trust in him was astounding, and he doubted he deserved it. Poe knew that he found the idea of harming Rey to be physically and spiritually repulsive, but still, to have her sleep before him while he kept watch was a trust that weighed heavily.

It didn’t help that he felt like a Massive Creep -- to borrow more modern vernacular. This was precisely what that Edward Cullen did, and he’d never felt any particular glow of affection for that de-fanged, whiny, pesky little bloodsucker. At least he was here by invitation, and hadn’t done anything so disturbing as to watch Rey from the shadows at her most vulnerable without her knowledge or permission.

He did not need sleep the way a human did, but as the night wore on, he found himself longing to be in the bed at Rey’s side, not in any improper or lustful way, but merely to wrap his arms around her and drift off into a rest that had been denied to him since his transformation over five hundred years ago. He longed for the humanity of it, the simple action of falling asleep and waking up to the woman he loved, of sharing in that part of her life with her; but that was blocked to him forever, and the difference between them remained insurmontable. 

Around three in the morning, Rey began to whisper to herself, her hair covering her eyes by this point, her hand covering her face as though protecting it.

“ _ Go away--” _ she whispered, her feet kicking out before she turned over. Her next words were inaudible, but he did not imagine the way her breath hitched. “ _ No _ \--”

To his great surprise, the small plant in the window began to grow, tendrils slithering towards the ground as Rey grew more restless on the bed. The potted succulents that lined her dresser rustled ominously, and a faint glow emitted from a tiny, green stone that had been placed, seemingly arbitrarily, at the vanity. 

“ _ You won’t -- I won’t let you  _ \--” Rey’s voice grew louder as her body seemed to lock into place. She then shouted, “ _ No! _ ” And all the plants in the room shook at once in an almighty wind that appeared from nowhere.

Poe leapt to his feet and crossed the room to the bedside; he grabbed Rey’s shin and tried to shake her awake to no avail. Then, he tried calling her name, but she was covering her ears with her hands, still shouting, so he grabbed her wrists and managed to haul her upright.

“Rey!” He shouted, trying to be heard over the rising wind. “Rey, wake up!”

The wind stilled immediately as Rey opened her eyes, and all the plants and objects in the room returned to their previous state, thuds and clatters echoing as things that had been floating in the wind settled once more. 

“What happened?” He asked gently as tears filled her eyes. “Rey, what did he say to you?”

“Poe,” she whispered.

“I’m here, my love.” He bent down to kiss her fingers one by one in demonstration. “I am with you.”

“No.” Rey shook her head, her tangled hair floating around her face. He frowned and pushed some of it behind her ears. “He said  _ Poe.  _ H-he knew your name, and h-he threatened to kill you. He said he would make me watch, and it would be all my fault.”

“It does not matter,” Poe assured her. “I have had dealings with the First Order in the past; they already knew my name.”

“He said he would kill you because of me,” Rey protested. “And  _ I  _ think that matters, whether or not you do! This is - it will be my fault!”

“No, it won’t.” Poe tried to soothe her before another wind storm seized the small bedroom. “If I die for you, I will not mind. I’ve died before, and I’m not afraid to die again, not when it would be for you. I--” He licked his lip nervously, aware he could never take this back when it was said. “I love you, Rey. I love only you, and to die for the person you love is not so bad a fate.”

She stared at him in the moonlight for a long moment, the sheets rucked up around her, her cheeks still flushed from her nightmare, her hair a tangled mess, and if he could truly cry, he would at the sight of her beauty. 

“But, don’t you see?” Rey grabbed his hands, animated once more. “I can’t let you die because I love you, and I’ve never loved  _ anyone  _ before, and - and - I can’t have the first person I’ve ever loved  _ die  _ because of me.”

“You love me?” Poe smiled, slow and unstoppable as he squeezed her hands.

“You would grab onto that,” Rey muttered, glaring down at her blankets. He could feel the blush radiating off of her, and he luxuriated in its heat. “I’m trying to say--”

“You love me,” Poe repeated, delirious with it, and Rey looked up, a small smile on her lips, before she nodded, once. 

He whooped in joy and used her hands to pull her from the bed and spin her around the room. Rey laughed as they spun, a golden-bright sound that filled every corner, bringing with it that same, strange glow that had occured in the moments before she’d woken up, only this time, the light was warm and healing, not eerie and fierce. 

“You love me!” Poe repeated, pulling her in to smile at her, his heart threatening to beat again for the first time in half a millenium. 

“I know,” Rey laughed, pushing more of her hair out of her face. “I just told you.”

“And I love you,” Poe said, serious despite the smile that seemed permanently etched on his face. “I love you terribly.”

“That’s good,” Rey darted in to kiss his cheek. “I guess we’re stuck with each other, then?”

“I suppose so,” Poe said, pulling back to bow at her. “Now, what shall we do about it?”

“I suppose we shall have to--” Rey mimicked his tone before tugging on his hands ferociously, pulling him back down to the bed with her; he tumbled down all too happily, allowing himself to be lost in this one, glorious moment of joy, where she loved him, and he loved her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm still not back on tumblr, but there's an update. I want to release the rest of them that I had written/planned as well, but I'm just not sure of the timeline of that as I'm still pretty discouraged about SW. 
> 
>  
> 
> Thanks for reading, and sorry for the collapse of my May the Fourth plan.


End file.
